Track Marks?

I once again have a railroad on my belly.... or a zipper...or little bugs....I had ANOTHER surgery!

I was opened up again on Thursday, November 16th at 1:30pm and this time, Dr. Ameri took a souvenir...my gallbladder.  My Gallbladder was gross...super gross....so gross that it needed to be removed.  So gross that when it was removed my surgeon told me that I had "an ugly gallbladder".

Let me tell you, it was a horrible experience.  Most of the people I had spoken to had told me that the surgery was relatively easy.  That the healing time wouldn't be so bad.  That is SO not true. I spent 14 hours in the hospital in level 10 pain.  Unable to move, breathe, talk, pass gas, eat, or relieve my bowels without help or pain.  And when I tell you that my gastric bypass surgery was easier, know that I went back and watched the old videos, I read the old blogs, and it was still an easier surgery.  Not only did the gas stay with me for the entirety of my healing time so far, but so did the gas pain, the bloating, and the inability to do anything by sleep sitting up and drink water.  UG!

Highlight of the past 2 weeks....Thanksgiving.  I was able to eat, I was able to walk around, and I got to spend time with my family whom I love very very much. Wonderful day, I hope yours was fantastic as well.

Low-point....having my roommate come into my bathroom, while I sat on the toilet in almost blackout pain to save me from passing out and hitting my head on my sink.  For the record, I called her, well text messaged her, from my toilet because I knew that something was wrong and couldn't do anything on my own.  I needed help, or I would have been found the next morning passed out with my pants around my ankles on the floor of my bathroom.  Nothing good about that.  Thank you Gloria for helping me that night.

So tomorrow, Wednesday November 30th I will have my staples removed, all 10 of them.  And then we will see how I'm feeling.  There is a possibility that I pulled an ab muscle...but if that's the worst of this left, I can handle it.

Gallbladder surgeries are very common after gastric bypass.  My surgeon says that 1 out of every 4 patients will need to have their gallbladders removed.  A friend of mine who works at the hospital, and the wonderful nurses who helped me this time (Thank you A4 RN's) think those numbers should be half of every patient.  This is a common side effect, and it's a painful one..at least for those who are post-op.

How did I know I needed surgery?  I realized something was wrong with my gallbladder because my feces were white. That's right everyone....I had pastel poop!

Dr. Oz taught me to watch my poop...that was a great way to diagnose a number of ailments.  Mine was white...or almost white, which is NOT normal.  So I saw my Dr. and when he pressed on my abdomen, where my gallbladder was located, it was tender.  NOT PAINFUL, just tender.  An ultrasound showed that I had a single, LARGE stone in my gall bladder.  A 7 millimeter stone.  That is roughly the total size of a normal, health gallbladder.  The bile duct out of the gallbladder is roughly 1.3mm large....so my stone just stopped up the works. No bile could get out, and yet I could store it....hence the ugly gall bladder.  Watch your poop everyone.  If I wasn't, I wouldn't have discovered this issue until much later...and it probably would have been an emergency removal.

Next up....a testimonial.  Dr. Ameri holds monthly support/informational meetings for people thinking about weight loss surgery or who have already had one of the surgeries.  At each meeting he asks a patient to give a testimonial about how their surgery went, and how they have had continued success.  On Tuesday, December 13th I will be the person giving a testimonial.   I am honored to share my story with those who are thinking about or have had weight loss surgery.  I'm going to ask if i can record the testimonial for my blog, and for my boyfriend who has a work obligation.  So stay tuned for information on that.

Thank you for sticking with me...for sticking with my lack of posts...and for sticking with me throughout my vast number of changes. My commitment to the blog hasn't changed, but boy has my life changed.  I will continue to change, but hopefully it will always be for the better.

What it's been like....and how I'm doing.

 

Home now

Alex came and took me home yesterday.  I was the first of my small group to come in, and the last one to leave.  Isn't that always the way?

There is still pain, there is still unbelievable pain, mostly at the drainage site  but it's been made a lot easier by a phenomenal group of nurses and case assistants, and by a group of friends that I've made over the last week. Cissy, Sarah, Christine and I have formed a bit of an alliance. LOL. Well, it's more like a parade. Everyone on the A3 floor would wave to us and cheer us on. The cleaning staff encouraged us to dance down the hall and would dance a little bit to encourage us. There was a patient at the other end of the hall, this nice older lady who had major surgery, but would walk down to our end of the hall specifically to check up on all of us. I've got to say, it was inspirational to see how people band together and support each other in a place like that.

I'm eternally thankful to the staff of floor A3. Thank you to the nurses who encouraged us to get up and walk and continued to give us the shots we asked them to skip just this once. Thank you to the case assistants who took our vital signs like clockwork, even at 4 in the morning when we were passed out and cranky, or when we were in so much pain calling them seemed like the only thing we could do. (And we did that A LOT!) Thank you to Dr. Ameri and his staff for doing an amazing job with all of us. (And Dr. Sabor for Chirstine) Thank you to the other patients on the floor who made me smile when we walked around, and who would share their incredible stories with us when we would stop. Thank you to all of my friends and family who came to visit me in the hospital, or who called Alex to get an update on my condition, or who just sent me a message letting me know that they were thinking about me. I never would have gotten through this without you.

And last but certainly not least, thank you to my walking friends. To Christine, who shared her mother and sister with us. Watching your experience, since it was so drastically different than ours was a learning tool for us. Listening to you and how you were adjusting was amazing, thank you.

To Sarah, my pre-op buddy. We didn't end up being roomies, and in the end it was ok. I think if we were roomies we wouldn't have met our other 2 buddies, and it was fabulous making a larger support group. Your texts in the middle of random procedures, like getting a draining tube removed, made me laugh until it hurt. I love that I have someone to run things by and talk to about all of this. You are definitely a life friend. Thank you.

To Cissy, my roommate. Girl, you kill me! I'm so sorry that I made you laugh so much that you thought that your staples were going to pop. But thank you for sharing your babies, you hot boy ;-) and your stories at 11 at night with me. Thank you for getting all dolled up for me on our last day. Pretty lady!  I hope that you keep in touch.  It's going to be amazing to watch your journey. 

I know that the 4 of us are going to make it through this successfully.  In 10 years we are going to look back and laugh about our times at Winchester Hospital, while we are all skinny and fabulous!   (Not that we aren't already)

I'm so happy that I met the 3 of you in the process. We all have the same, new birthday and the same new lives coming. I can't wait to watch and share this with you ladies!

Water.....1/20/10

It's day #3 in the hospital. Things have been going really well so far. Yesterday was the worst day though.

This is the deal; after your surgery you wake up with a binding on your stomach, to keep your stitches steady. Also, coming out of one of the stitched areas is a drain. It drains out small amounts of blood and any other liquid that is building up. (Gross I know) So they have to empty the drain a few times a day. Most of the time, it is not a big deal. The drain looks like a water balloon that is plastic, so it has a plug in it that opens easily. The problem is that every now and again they need to "strip the tube" that comes out of your belly into the drain. Basically, they hold onto the end closest to your tummy, and then they take the nail and squeeze the tube until they get to the drain. The process only takes a few seconds, and it helps keep the drain from getting clotted. This is EXTREMELY painful. The pain was so much that I was bent over for a few hours yesterday before I could get my pain meds again. It was horrible.

That is all I have wanted since Monday. I need water more than I can express. Swabbing your mouth just is not the same as actually drinking something. It's just a tease....hold on here comes the nurse.

15 minutes later....I was just given my first little tiny sip of water in 3 days. OMG that was the best thing ever. I knew that I was thirsty but I had NO idea I was that thirsty! They give us 6 cups that are 2 Tbsp apiece. I'm on my second round and am SO happy....SO happy.

It's DONE!

A message from Linz, hours after surgery...

:)