Surgery Done!

 The surgery was a success and we will be heading home tomorrow. We have a nice warm foot with good pulses and the patient is a bit grumpy with his pain level.

We had to come a day early and spend the night in order to arrive at the hospital at 6 this morning. The time for the surgery changed from 1 pm to 7:30 am on Saturday and we had to scramble to change our plans. I was still recovering from my bout of flu and not looking forward to any of it. I still have that dog bark cough lingering.

I kept thinking that I was taking so long to recover, but really it has only been 10 days, so I can say with conviction that the Tamiflu does a good job. But you know how it is when you are sick. I slept with my neck hyper extended to the right and now I can't turn my head freely. It was really painful yesterday as we drove to Atlanta and got worse as the day progressed. About halfway to our destination I discovered the one thing I forgot to toss in my purse ..... Tylenol.

We stayed at a hotel very close to the hospital, on Peachtree Street. I was hurting so bad by the time we got to the room. HeWho went to a vending machine and paid $3 for 2 Advil. Fingers of pain were wrapping around the base of my skull and I swallowed the spendy pills and lay as still as I could.

When one has a headache, they want quiet and dark. Sadly they don't always get what they want! The headache subsided, but the neck pain was still hanging on. Sleep was elusive due to the sirens and noise on the street. Someone must have checked in to the room above us and I wondered if they were using the beds as trampolines and jumping to the floor. I finally dozed off.

The fancy lamps and plug-ins beside the bed didn't work, so our phones were across the room. My phone was silent throughout the night. The phone of the hearing impaired man I live with was on the absolute loudest volume. It dinged all night with various crap like weather reports. That was bad enough, but he has the RING alert set to sound like windchimes. All night long they chimed, everytime the wind blew something in the camera's view.

Then, there was the snoring. I was wide awake when the alarm sounded at 5 am. I got up and listened as HeWho proclaimed that he had not slept. I assured him that he did indeed sleep and I was surprised he didn't suck the drapes up his nose. I stood in a hot shower hoping to loosen my neck and got ready for the long day ahead.

Among other things defective in our room was the fact that the wi-fi was not working and those outlets weren't working. The bed was comfy and the linen clean. But the toilet had issues. Have you ever seen those child sized toilets? Very, very low to the floor. The Target I used to frequent had stalls for children with these low-lying toilets. I thought they were so cute, but not really practical, since children do grow rather quickly. The toilet in this room made me feel like I was squatting on the floor with my knees at my chin.

Let me just say that I am far too old and stiff to be happy with this toilet! I was not sad to leave this room behind before the sun appeared! We arrived at the hospital and valet checked the car since HeWho can't walk far and started the process of checking into the hospital. After presenting my proof of ID a sticky label was adhered to my chest and they took the man in question back to be prepped.

I was sitting stiff-necked and caffiene free in an uncomfortabe chair. I needed some Tylenol and coffee and a nice lady offered me some of her Tylenol. I saw the bottle and she took some, too, so I took my chances and scooted over to the Starbucks located in the hospital. I had just taken a delightful third sip of my black coffee that I paid $4 for when they summoned me to the pre-op area. I had to abandon my coffee and almost cried. The nice man at the desk put it aside for me, but it was cold by the time I got back to it.

The in-take nurse was firing questons at the nearly deaf man of mine whose hearing aids were in my possession. I went over his meds and other pertinent info they needed and then he started talking about blood transfusions and they were starting an arterial line in addition to the two large bore IV's already going. Things started to get serious then. I was sent back to wait. I tried every type of seat in the waiting room and unlike Goldilocks I never did find the one that was just right. One had no back support and made my neck hurt worse, a couple had my feet dangling from the end of my short legs.

Three long hours of surgery and my stomach was churning. I was afraid to go find food, lest they have an update. I was about to take my chances and go get something to eat when they took me to a consultation room. Back in the day, this was the bad news room. I wanted to burst into tears, but managed some self control as I waited in that lonely room.

Don't be thinking I handled all this with any dignity! I started to sweat profusely. I could feel the sweat rolling down my spine and dripping off the tip of my nose. It is not like you can control sweat! I was quite damp when the doctor came in and shook my hand with it wet palm. I am surprised I was able to control myself enough to not start laughing hysterically. 

Everything went well, no extra blood had to pumped into him and the prognosis is good. We do have to do this again with his right leg. We will be old hand at this soon!