Almost 11 months after the original injury, I had my leg re-broken.
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| Pre-Op Smiles :) |
The day surgery nurses are starting to remember me. I arrived at the hospital the morning of my surgery, sleepy and hungry. I'm not allowed to eat anything for like 12 hours before surgery. It was all the same at the last two times. take of all your clothes, put on the uncomfortable hospital gown. Get poked and poked by IV's and needles. They kept me for a couple hours before surgery for observation to make sure I was stable. Getting wheeled into the operating room was the same at always. I looked at the clock, it was 10:40 am. Then I got a needle in my back, needles in my leg, and drugs in my IV. Dizzy, then sleepy, then nothing.
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Dr Steeves initials the leg to
be operated on. |
When I came to, I immediately knew I was not in the recovery room. I could hear doctors talking loudly. I opened my eyes and saw a blue sheet. I turned my head and saw I was still in the operating room. I was still being operated on! I saw my anesthesiologist above me.
I said "Can I go back to sleep?"
"Are you awake?" he asked.
"Yeah. But I want to go back to sleep. I'm not done." I wasn't really panicking about being awake on the table.
"Okay were working on it. Just hang on." he said. Then I hear Dr. Steeves voice. I couldn't see him, the blue sheet blocked everything.
"Do you like the music?" he asked me.
"No" I whined.
"Why not?"
"I don't hear any music." Maybe my brain just couldn't process music at that point, because I don't remember music. I wish I did. Maybe I can pick the playlist for my next surgery.
I started to cry. I wasn't in pain, I didn't feel anything. I just cried and asked to be put back to sleep. The anesthesiologist put a mask on my face and asked my to count down from ten. I don't remember counting at all.
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| Post-op discomfort |
My surgery took two hours. When I came to in the recovery room, It was almost 6:30 pm. I had come out of surgery around 1 pm, but I had stayed asleep. Sometimes the body just needs to rest. I remember having dreams. In one of them I was being put into one of those cupboards in the morgue. In another, I was being isolated in this room with rusted pipes, no windows and a faint green light. I don't know why. Dreams are weird. Anyways, When I woke up, I was crying, as usual. I always cry when waking up from surgery. There was a nurse beside me and she asked how I felt. I told her I woke up in the surgery. She said "I know! Its so strange." When I spoke, I realized my throat was killing me. When I told this to the nurse, she said it was because they had to put a breathing tube in me after I woke up in surgery. I don't remember them taking the tube out.
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| My daddy is the best |
After waking up and getting my stats up (blood pressure, oxygen sat, pulse) they sent me back to the surgical ward. There the nurses get me to go to the bathroom. They also make sure I can drink and eat without getting sick. And after they have observed me to see that I'm okay, they discharge me. My dad came to get me at 8 pm. He brought me a balloon, I love balloons.
When I got home, I went right to bed. My friend Carolyn came over to help care for me. At about 2 am, the nerve block in my knee wore off and I was in so much pain that I cried out loud for a few hours. The pain I felt was just as bad as my very first surgery, just as bad as when I was lying on that sidewalk with shattered bones. When Carolyn called the Telehealth nurse, she asked me to rate my pain. I used my 10. I never say 10 because what is I can have a worse pain. But this was blinding agony with no relief. I decided to take the max dose of painkillers. and it took the edge off just enough so I could sleep. But sleep was uneasy and the pain was almost unbearable.
