i called CHB at 3pm the business day before my November 12 scheduled surgery date. i was to report to the pre-op room at 6am for 7:30am surgery. we arrived in BOS the day before surgery and checked into Yawkey Family Inn. for some freak reason, my blackberry started to go on the fritz and my brand new suitcase had crooked wheels. so i took care of these errands, got some groceries to put in our YFI food cubbies and then got an early dinner to comply with the 8hr NPO restriction prior to surgery. i decided to try to get one last boost of iron so i chose legal sea foods to try to get some clams and shellfish. the next morning i had a juicy juice apple juice carton at 5am then we set off for the hospital for 6am arrival.
everyone asked me if i was nervous. i wasn't sure what to be nervous about. even in the waiting room, none of the kids there seemed to care and i'm like 3-4x's older than all of them! nurse mary took me in and did vitals, made sure i hadn't put anything in my mouth per NPO instructions, and checked that i had no polish on my nails (to monitor oxygen during surgery). i had to give urine (standard pregnancy test). i made sure all my tubes were emptied and then we were called up to the holding room.
i changed into my hospital gown and put all the clothes i was wearing in a brown paper bag. a bunch of people visited me--anesthesiology, residents, fellow. i got poked a few times and Dr Millis initialed my left thigh. i think they gave me a happy drug. i remember being rolled into a room that had lots of stuff. they told me they were giving me something...and that's all i remember.
when i woke up, someone was saying my name and asked me to wiggle my toes. i had a mask on my face and i was wrapped up all over from head to toe. they wrapped my whole mid-section in mummy gauze (aka the millis diaper). my guy was saying sweet nothings to me which i wasn't registering. i felt very nauseated, my throat hurt, and i was very groggy. i got poked a bunch of times because my sodium and potassium levels weren't normal. after 4.5 hours in recovery (i think i was one of the last ones in there), i was wheeled up to my hospital room. i opened my eyes at one point but had such bad motion sickness so i just closed my eyes.
my surgery report is they cut the acetabulum from the pelvis, rotated it laterally and put in 4 screws. they decided not to explore the joint capsule but may scope it in the future to visualize the labrum and medial cystic cartilage abnormalities that showed up in my pre-op MRI. i lost 900ml of blood and was in there a standard 4.5hrs.
my first night in the hospital was a blur of beeping and flashing lights thru my groggy haze. i had zero pain but intense nausea. when i had to lift myself up with the trapeze handle for someone to check my epidural, i had such bad motion sickness and dry-heaved. i also couldn't tolerate talking on the phone, esp when my sister called with her cheery non-church voice. the respirator machine kept beeping cuz it didn't think i was breathing. then it would set off the nurse alarm. they completely turned off my epidural for about 30min for the pain team to figure out how to manage my meds. they also took a chest xray to make sure my lungs hadn't collapsed. i had a bout of intense tightness in my jaw and upper body. my teeth were chattering and i couldn't relax my neck and shoulders. i had itchiness on my chest area. my epidural had started at 15 and was titrated down in 2.5 increments until they decided that 7.5 was a good level for me. i was on dilaudad and bupivicaine for pain, and zofran and reglan for nausea.
they gave me an incentive spirometer, a contraption to blow into to keep my airways open. i had to blow hard enough so these balls would rise in their tubes. i was supposed to do it 10x/hr but it gave me a bad headache so i wasn't very diligent. they also had pneumoboots on my calves to help circulation. my guy fed me ice chips throughout the night. ice never tasted so good.
the medical team decided that i am extremely sensitive to opiates which is why i had such bad nausea from the epidural (i guess i didn't experiment enough in my younger years). prior to surgery, i passed out before they were able to get the epidural in me. i think getting in an epidural requires patient cooperation but i was lights out already. in my hospital bed, the pain team didn't bother giving me the control button to increase my epidural strength.
my guy's parents visited briefly. i didn't think i felt that bad but his mom was staring at me like i was on my last breath and holding my hands very dearly. i remember wanting to brush my teeth very badly. they have toothbrush and toothpaste at the hospital (plus baby shampoo, dial soap and keri lotion).
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