Friday, December 17, 2010

Prepping for Surgery

Yesterday, I had one hell of a morning.

First, CD3 b/w and meeting with my RE for a pre-op appt.  Then, we raced back to see our counselor. Then I had pre-op testing at the hospital.

I’d been dreading it all week. It was really stressing me out.  Luckily, DH was coming with me for all of it. I told him the night before we had to get up at 5:30am to get to our first appt. on time.  That forewarning was needed, as he has a difficult time getting up in the morning.

Of course, 4am rolled around and DH wakes me up with his snoring.  I shook him lightly to turn over so that I could fall back asleep. Around that time, I determine that I can get away with getting up at 6am instead, and I reset my alarm for that.

For the first time in his life, I think, DH actually got up at 5:30am. So impressed.  I didn’t get up till 6am, but I’m really glad he got up earlier, as by the time I got up he’d barely brushed his teeth.  We were out of the house by a quarter to 7am and headed for the RE’s office 1/2 an hour away.

We got there 15 minutes before my appt. because I had to be out of there by 8:30am at the latest to make it back close to home to go to the therapist.

So we waited, and waited. I’m starting to freak out because this whole day is going to domino badly if we’re late for anything.  At 7:55am we STILL hadn’t been seen.  K goes off to find someone.
When I’m just about to burst into tears, finally another nurse comes into the room to do my U/S. She hurriedly moves through it, then sends me off to get the b/w done before we see the RE.  We’re actually out of there (U/S, b/w AND RE appt.) by 8:15am! Awesome.

Head back home and split up into two cars (since we were going to have to go separately to work later) and get to the therapist on time, then leave the therapist’s office only 5 min late. Another score!
I had no idea where we were going for the hospital and when I looked it up on the GPS, the directions didn’t make any sense. But DH took control and told me to follow him, which made me so much less stressed. We arrived right on time, gave the cars to the free valet and easily found pre-op testing.
I had an EKG and more bloodwork taken, and we met with the nurse for an interview over my medical history.  Then we were told my RE had ordered a chest x-ray.

I balked. I didn’t understand why I needed to have one.  I’m having surgery on my uterus, not my heart.  I’ve had so many chest xrays and radiation in my life, I just didn’t want to have anything unncessary done.  The nurse called my RE’s office to find out why, and was told by the nurses that he ordered one so I had to have one.  Well, that pissed me off.  I wanted to know the medical reason. If it was somehow needed for anesthesia or something, fine, I would definitely do it, but I didn’t see how it was.

I finally got a hold of one nurse who talked to the RE and said that if I talked to anesthesia and they said I didn’t need one then it was ok.  A quick two second talk with anesthesia proved me right, it wasn’t necessary. So we were done!

A long morning, but one that was made so much more less stressful by DH driving me to my first appt. then leading the way to the hospital and, of course, being with me every step of the way.

Surgery is scheduled for next Tuesday afternoon now and I’m dreading it. It’s my first non-cardiac surgery and I’m just scared they’re going to do something wrong because I don’t trust them as much as my cardiologist.  I’m also afraid they’re going to end up making me stay the night just because they’re scared of my heart and scared to let me go.

In good news however, my CD3 b/w came back quiet so I started taking BCP last night. As I took my first pill I looked at DH and said, this seems so counterintuitive to everything we’ve been trying to do. But it will save a cycle for me so I hope this works!

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