The Night Before - Soothing Tea and Insomnia

Insomnia - sleep - who needs to sleep? -  This is the argument my mind and I are currently having and sadly my mind seems to be winning. However, Sleepy time tea is having a calming effect and soothing the roller coaster of nerves. Tonight I have proceeded to pack my hospital bag and probably over pack as it is impossible to pack light when you are adventuring into unknown situations. The hospital didn't inform me about things like socks? underwear? and I wearing my own panties or hospital panties. And trust me I hope that they are not hospital underwear there is no way on this planet that hospital underwear is cute or comfortable! Nonetheless, whatever happens tomorrow will happen for the best ugly underwear or not :) 

As nervous as I may be it amazes me how everything has perfectly fallen into place from the timing with work, to the easiness of applying for medical employment insurance, to being very prepared. At this point my sanity is rooted in my knowing that everything is going just as planned and whatever hiccups are thrown my way will be tackled with a fierce mind. 

Lets go to war against this darn disease and conquer it !

See you all in a few days...post surgery! Hospital at 6:30am and then surgery commences approx 9:30am. I will post when the anesthetic wears off and my mind is able to focus on making a legible sentence. 

<3

Kitty Therapist to the Rescue

Packing my hospital bag and a certain someone thought that he was coming with me. Perhaps he would be the best therapy in the hospital. I do believe they need to change the No Animals rule :)
- Love you Rajah <3

Colorful Zipper Hoodies, Grippy Socks, French Braids, and Love

Four days away from spinal fusion surgery and my mind is racing. The oddities that I have been purchasing or acquiring has been very entertaining. Everything from colorful hoodies (zip up! as my arms will not be able to be raised above my head), grippy socks as fall protection, a raised toilet seat, a hand grabber, shower seat, and slip on shoes are all just part of my preparation procedures. My boyfriends mom is going to french braid my hair the day before which may remind me of my childhood but will save my sanity in the hospital. I am sure it would not help the recovery situation if my hair is a knotty mess and in my face without me being able to pull it back. Therefore, I am very grateful :). In addition, I have been pleasantly surprised with the love and support coming from so many caring friends and family, it relieves the stress knowing that people are here and will continue to be here to provide support after.

On a funny note, I have come to the conclusion that I have become way to comfortable discussing poop :) and therefore, I will continue with my comfortable conversation and explain why this is a topic that needs to be discussed.  It is extremely common to experience constipation post surgery. With all the medications and pain killers being pumped through your system your body will definitely begin to back up. Now this may seem like a small issue but imagine insane bloating and stomach pain pushing back on your fragile spine (OUCH!). If the bloating and constipation gets too bad after you are released to go home you can even be rushed back to the emergency for an enima (ugh). The nurses / doctors will most likely prescribe laxatives to take with the medication which will help a lot. I was discussing this with my family Doctor (i.e. Dr. Justin Balko) to which he said that sometimes doctors prescribe medications which work but are extremely hard for your system to digest and can cause nausea. Therefore he recommended a laxative which he personally uses for his young children, it is called easy-lax and it can be picked-up at any local drug store. Supposedly, it is very easy on the stomach and just as effective as the harsher drugs given at the hospital (I sure hope it works - the last thing in this world I want is an enima!). So really my take away message from this is I need to remember to drink lots of prune juice, monitor my body, stay away from foods that cause bloating, and to use a laxative if needed.

6 Days.... and Freaking Out

6 days....I thought I was going to begin stressing out at the 10 day point; however, I  have seemed to maintain my sanity longer then expected. Excellent news is that the timing of the surgery works with my families schedules so that they will be able to come visit me in the hospital.

Here is the information I have so far -  I go into the hospital on March 25 and will be there till the 29th or 30th. The nurse told me that I will receive a phone call the night of the 24th sometime after 4:00pm informing me exactly what time to arrive at the hospital. From there I will go through about 4-5 different check points to ensure that I am the correct patient, the anesthetic is correct, and various blood and vital signs tests.  Then the surgery will begin...It will take about 4-5 hours if everything goes correctly then I will wake up laying on my back groggy and a bit disorientated.
Of course I have tons more of information regarding IV's, pain meds, catheters, PCA's and etc.. but I feel like I need to save something to write about while I am laying in the hospital or later at home in bed. Plus, my vast amount of overwhelming information may mean a lot more to me once I have personally experienced the situation. 

18 days .... and Counting

Have you ever felt like no matter how prepared you think you are the day you are waiting for will be just a blink away and you will find yourself completely and utterly unprepared. - Welcome to my current state of mind - Do I clean now or the night before, what about groceries - will anyone feed me, my cats litter box, my super clean weekly scrubbed baseboards, and lets not discuss cleaning toilets! I swear I will come out of this with a straight spine and an overwhelming anxiety disorder.

Tree's are perfect representations of the scoliosis spine - often twisted and a bit misshapen - they still continue to grow and reach towards the sky

Pre Admission Clinic

6 hours of pre admission tests to make sure I'm all good to go for surgery