So I’ve had my second surgery for the year. This one came from totally out of the blue. Thankfully, it is in no way related to the
last, which means it doesn’t affect our chances of getting knocked up.
We are currently trying to get pregnant. The longer I'm off the pill for the more irregular my cycle gets, so I'm using basal thermometer reading (plus monitoring other stuff) to work out when I'm ovulating. This is the first month I’ve been doing this,
so I’ve been hyper conscious of my body.
A few weeks ago I noticed some pain on my right hand side. It was around the time that I was due to
ovulate – so I thought it was that. I
had two nights of really bad gastro cramping and almost no sleep, so figured my
IBS was playing up. After getting home
Saturday night after Sarah’s book launch, I was horrendously ill. The next morning I noticed that the right
side of my stomach was swollen. After
putting all of this together, I realised I had most of the symptoms of non-acute appendicitis, and went to the doctor.
My GP suspected the same, but the pain wasn’t acute enough
to warrant hospital. He gave me antibiotics,
which often helps settle a rumbling appendix, and advised me to go to hospital
if it got any worse. I said ‘See, I told
you’ to Murray - very proud with my accurate self diagnosis.
I didn’t go to work on Monday as I still had pain, and by
Wednesday it hadn’t gotten any worse, but it also hadn’t gotten any better so I
decided to go to hospital to be safe.
Antibiotics usually kick in within 48 hours so something was not right.
After a while in emergency awaiting test results, I saw
a doctor. Everything was fine. Apart from my pain and gastro symptoms, my
temperature was normal, blood tests normal - everything normal. I thought they were going to send me
home. I told the doctor that I was very nervous. The idea of a
rumbling appendix was just like an ectopic pregnancy, like having a bomb in
your body that could go off at any time.
She took me seriously, and after an ultrasound also appeared
normal, said I should stay overnight for observation in the surgical ward. I was extremely grateful.
After seeing the surgical registrar, the decision was
made to pop a camera in there, and check everything was ok. They didn’t think I had appendicitis, but
agreed that something was not as it should be.
Again, I was so grateful. I am
very used to people thinking I'm crazy.
Even if they found nothing, my mind would be at ease, which would mean I might be able to get some sleep. Every time my stomach cramped it pressed on
whatever was hurting in my right hand side, and made me scared it would
explode. The idea of my insides exploding is scary. I don't sleep when I'm scared.
The night in hospital wasn’t great. I didn’t sleep, and in the morning,
there was a drama.
I'm good with
needles, but needles aren’t good with me. When I arrived at the hospital it took three attempts to
get a line in. The successful lure hadn’t
been used for about 20 hours when the nurse tried to attach the
drip pre-surgery. She put the
fluid through to clean the line and it felt wrong. I've had this done many times, so know what it usually feels like. I told her, and she ignored
me. Then she started the drip. It got progressively more painful. Then my arm blew up like a
balloon. I firmly told her she had
to stop the drip, and she did.
I was amazed she didn’t take the line out. My arm was huge. The lure had popped out of the vein so everything
had gone straight into my arm. It
felt very odd. After an hour of looking
at my blown up arm with the lure still in it I buzzed for the nurse.
‘Please can you take this out?’
‘Why, is it hurting?
I’ll get you another pillow.’
It seemed ridiculous she was questioning this quite logical request. I completely lost the plot.
‘No (sob) it (sob) doesn’t hurt (sob). I just (sob) haven’t (sob) had any sleep
(sob) and (sob) I got (sob) a really big fright (sob).’
It took half an hour to stop sobbing.
The nurse totally freaked. She had someone take the lure out, and checked
on me every five minutes until her shift finished. Then she checked on me as she was leaving. It was one of those things that is quite
hilarious in retrospect, but is SOOOO traumatic at the time.
Another lure was put into a friendlier vein, and I was in
surgery by 10.30am. It always amazes me
how many people there are in surgery.
There were at least seven in this one, and it was a simple, laproscopic
procedure. They told me they would take
my appendix out regardless which was a huge relief – I never have to worry
about it exploding, ever. The anaesthetist held the oxygen mask on my face very hard,
pushing his thumb up under my jaw. It
really hurt, but I just said to myself ‘Don't worry, you’ll be unconscious soon.’ And I was.*
I had the best wake up from surgery ever (last time I asked the nurses the same question over and over, and demanded drugs until I went blue cos my oxygen sats dropped). I woke up 12 minutes after going
into recovery and felt pretty great. The
procedure had taken 45 minutes – about 20 minutes longer than anticipated. They had found a burst ovarian cyst which had
put gunk through all my insides. This is
what was causing the pain and gastric issues.
They cleaned it all out and removed my (healthy) appendix.
Recovery has been physically more taxing than the
last. I think they had to move things
around a bit as I have more bruising and swelling than with my last surgery. I overdid things on Sunday (I washed dishes,
tidied and hung up washing) which caused my surgical sites to bleed – I have
been much better at resting since then.
A week on from surgery and I’m feeling pretty good. Still a little sore and still tired but I
think my stomach muscles have knitted back together as sitting up doesn’t hurt
any more.
The sucky thing about this unexpected surgery is how it
impacts on work. The timing could not be
poorer. Well, it could. We’re also heading to Melbourne for a holiday
shortly, so I’m glad this didn’t happen then.
It means we won't have much to spend in Melbourne because excess
money is covering my mortgage payments while I’m off work. But in all honesty our flights and fancy accommodation
is paid, we’re going to Armageddon for free thanks to our amazing friend
Richard - so we’ll have a great time anyway.
And I’ve said this before, and I’ll say it again; I am employed by
wonderful people. I am so grateful that
after two unexpected surgeries and almost 6 weeks off work this year, I still
have a job.
The other sucky thing is it’s mucked up my first month of
basal thermometer reading. And I have to be less smug about my (non)skills at self-diagnosis.
*Following surgery I had a cut inside my lip and a bruise
under my jaw. I should have said
something, but it’s physically difficult to talk when you’re JUST about to go
under for surgery, and someone is tightly holding a mask over your face.
