Post Surgery Update

After being home for 6 weeks after surgery, I am ready to get out of the house.  It's been hard lying around all the time and even though I have no strength to do anything else, I am looking forward to my post-op doctor visit. In the past 6 weeks I have totally followed doctor's orders. I wear the bone stimulator 12 hours a day and I've been off all the pain medication since February 15th. The medication was making me sick to my stomach and I can hardly eat.  Everything makes me gag. I keep doing my walking laps as required then drink lots of water and even that is hard to get down.

My Hardware

I am staying hopeful that these days go by quickly because this recovery is hard. At my doctor visit today, we discuss my progress and how well I am doing. Each visit will include an x-ray of my spine. So I can see all that hardware. Wow!

I now get to start physical therapy and get moving. I am really looking forward to getting through this and getting better.

Chloe's 4th Birthday

Chloe's Birthday Cake

We celebrated Chloe's 4th birthday today.  She loves My Little Ponies so her mother decorated her cake with the cute little characters. We had pizza and cake and lots of presents.  And of course, balloons.

Chloe's Birthday Balloons

Uncle Greg helps with Chloe's Birthday Candles

Aunt Kelly helps with the Presents

Post Surgery Update

Today is the day I get to take the steri-strips off of my incision.  Actually, Jeff gets to do that since I cannot reach them.  So he took a before and after photo of my progress. I really have a hard time looking at these. They make me woozy.  I would make a terrible nurse.

Here's to Healing!

Get well flowers are so uplifting. On these dreary cold winter days, they sure perk me up.

Plus my daughter made me a little pocket to hang on the walker and my granddaughters needed to make sure I had company so I am carting around chickens.

To top things off my daughter-in-law sent me a gift card for Kindle books. I love it, however my attention span is around 20 minutes per day.  I wish I could read longer but I an so so tired.

 Here's to healing!

Post Surgery Hospital Stay

Saturday in the hospital was easy. The staff made me get up and walk. It was easier than I thought.  The epidural line was removed from my abdomen and I was now on Oxycontin and Oxycodone. No more pain killers directly to the incision. I still didn't feel anything, so it was all good. I was supposed to eat but I just wasn't interested.  I also sat in a chair. I still mostly want to sleep which is what I did when I wasn't doing breathing treatments.

Sunday was the same.  Still not interested in food but I had to eat before they would let me go home.  I took walks with the physical therapist and sat up for a while.  My mom came to visit and while she was here the anesthesiologist came and took the epidural line out of my back.  Still no pain, so I was doing OK. Too bad they had to pull that out while mom was here, I'm not sure I could sit through seeing that. The only problem was I started to itch everywhere. The nurse brought some Benadryl, she said it was a side effect from the medication.  That was the worst symptom I had during my entire stay.

Monday I got to go home. But first I had to learn how to get in and out of bed.  So the physical therapist and I worked on that. It was not easy. But I got it. Then after going over discharge instructions and getting medications together, we were ready to go. There is nothing better than home.

Post Surgery - Remembering Friday

I have been home from the hospital for three days now.  I will try and re-cap what I remember from my 5-day stay.  I thought I could write this all in one day but I am exhausted after 20 minutes of typing. So it might take me a while to write it all down.
Friday: I am scheduled for surgery at 9:30 but 9:30 goes by then 10, then 10:30 and I start to get anxious. The physician's assistant finally comes in to apologize because their first case of the day was tougher than they anticipated. He said there was a lot of scar tissue to get through and they wanted to do it right. I asked why he thinks he should apologize for doing a good job. Besides, I'm not going anywhere.

I finally get rolled into surgery a little after noon.  I remember seeing the operating room and the anesthesiologist starting to place an oxygen mask on me. The last thing I remember is seeing it about 6 inches from my face.

I woke up in the recovery room to two more IVs in my hand. One was a central line, and as soon as I was conscious, the nurse started to remove it. The thing about those is they have to apply pressure for 15 minutes straight so she was very close to me and I felt very safe. I felt nothing in my back which was good. The epidurals were working.  I also had no more pain in my hips and I wondered if that was just from the epidural as well.

I got back to my room after 8pm.  Jeff was waiting patiently. He stayed with me until late into the night then went home to bed.  I don't remember the rest of the night.  Sleep is good and it comes easily.