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it's still so swollen. But I digress. Let me start again at the surgery.
So, as you well knew, I went in on Friday for surgery of an unknown type since we weren't sure what was wrong with me. My understanding was that Dr. Lee was going in to excise the tushie and find out why blood and puss were still coming out after a year. It was supposed to be a half hour in and out surgery. It was a little different...
At 8:30am on Friday January 7, 2011, I went back under the knife. What was supposed to be a quick surgery ended up being a bit more involved. After going in, Dr. Lee found out there was an infection in my anal sinus. What's that, you say? I have no clue still, since I didn't know there was one there. According to wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anal_sinuses . The surgery ended up taking an hour and a half because the infection was longer than he anticipated. I spent a little bit in recovery after surgery, waiting for my room upstairs. Apparently, Dr. Lee was thinking of sending me home same day. My body had different ideas.
They took me upstairs to my room, pumped full of dilaudid (since I told them I have a narcotic intolerance to morphine). What a mistake! I got upstairs, they told me I would be fine, had me on the pain killers, the zofran, and the phenergan for the nausea. The problem is, the zofran wore off and the phenergan was supposed to be administered into my iv line with an automatic pump thingie into which the plunger full of medicine was placed. I had the fortunate luck to have a very bad nurse who never bothered to see if the pump thingie was working. It wasn't. I was without any anti nausea medicine for a while, and that, coupled with one of the strongest narcotics (stupid doctors for giving it to me) and I ended up barfing most of the night on Friday. If there was one blessing in all of that, I was given chocolate chip cookies with dinner, so when everything came back up it tasted like chocolate instead of bile.
The next morning at an unholy hour of 2:30am, the phlebotomist came in trying to draw my blood. I told them to go away, they weren't allowed to since I was supposed to go home on Saturday and didn't want yet another blown vein. Surprisingly, he listened. Yay me!
At 6:45am, the residents rounded and told me I'd be going home, in spite of the barfing. When the rounding doctor came in at 7:30am, they told me that I would NOT be going home since I couldn't keep food down, and they kept telling me they weren't sure why I wasn't able to eat and keep food down. I kept insisting that if they changed my pain medicine to a non-narcotic, particularly toradol, which is essentially extra strength Motrin in iv form. Gee, once they switched me they were able to get both my pain under control and do away with the nausea meds, and I kept down food. Plan then was to go home on Sunday.
Sunday morning (2:30am again) my newest night nurse came in and turned on ALL the lights. She almost got decked, and I have a mean right hook. She insisted on checking my ostomy. I didn't have surgery on that!!! I kept trying to tell her, and she insisted in looking at it. Then she looked at my butt and left. Thankfully she did not come back in for the remainder of the morning/evening. Blissfully, I was discharged Sunday after that, and sent home for post op care. More to follow...
So, as you well knew, I went in on Friday for surgery of an unknown type since we weren't sure what was wrong with me. My understanding was that Dr. Lee was going in to excise the tushie and find out why blood and puss were still coming out after a year. It was supposed to be a half hour in and out surgery. It was a little different...
At 8:30am on Friday January 7, 2011, I went back under the knife. What was supposed to be a quick surgery ended up being a bit more involved. After going in, Dr. Lee found out there was an infection in my anal sinus. What's that, you say? I have no clue still, since I didn't know there was one there. According to wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anal_sinuses . The surgery ended up taking an hour and a half because the infection was longer than he anticipated. I spent a little bit in recovery after surgery, waiting for my room upstairs. Apparently, Dr. Lee was thinking of sending me home same day. My body had different ideas.
They took me upstairs to my room, pumped full of dilaudid (since I told them I have a narcotic intolerance to morphine). What a mistake! I got upstairs, they told me I would be fine, had me on the pain killers, the zofran, and the phenergan for the nausea. The problem is, the zofran wore off and the phenergan was supposed to be administered into my iv line with an automatic pump thingie into which the plunger full of medicine was placed. I had the fortunate luck to have a very bad nurse who never bothered to see if the pump thingie was working. It wasn't. I was without any anti nausea medicine for a while, and that, coupled with one of the strongest narcotics (stupid doctors for giving it to me) and I ended up barfing most of the night on Friday. If there was one blessing in all of that, I was given chocolate chip cookies with dinner, so when everything came back up it tasted like chocolate instead of bile.
The next morning at an unholy hour of 2:30am, the phlebotomist came in trying to draw my blood. I told them to go away, they weren't allowed to since I was supposed to go home on Saturday and didn't want yet another blown vein. Surprisingly, he listened. Yay me!
At 6:45am, the residents rounded and told me I'd be going home, in spite of the barfing. When the rounding doctor came in at 7:30am, they told me that I would NOT be going home since I couldn't keep food down, and they kept telling me they weren't sure why I wasn't able to eat and keep food down. I kept insisting that if they changed my pain medicine to a non-narcotic, particularly toradol, which is essentially extra strength Motrin in iv form. Gee, once they switched me they were able to get both my pain under control and do away with the nausea meds, and I kept down food. Plan then was to go home on Sunday.
Sunday morning (2:30am again) my newest night nurse came in and turned on ALL the lights. She almost got decked, and I have a mean right hook. She insisted on checking my ostomy. I didn't have surgery on that!!! I kept trying to tell her, and she insisted in looking at it. Then she looked at my butt and left. Thankfully she did not come back in for the remainder of the morning/evening. Blissfully, I was discharged Sunday after that, and sent home for post op care. More to follow...
