First full postop day

Well, I am sleeved! I had my surgery yesterday with Dr V. As he had suspected, I did have a hiatal hernia, the more rare kind as it turns out, a paraesophageal hernia. This means that my stomach was bulging up through the hiatus right next to my esophagus. So he was able to repair that as well as do my sleeve. I have a keepsake picture of my hernia…lol…aren’t I lucky?

So the blow by blow of surgery day. My brother drove me to the hospital at 6:30. The timing of being at the hospital was hard because our younger kids daycare doesn’t open until 7, so hubby had to take them into daycare and then come down to the hospital later.

They took me back about 7 am to begin prepping me. I had drank gallons of fluid the day before because I am not an easy stick. They had noted this on my chart because of their experience trying to draw my blood in the preop labs, so the nurse was ready for me, warmed my arms with warm blankets and then hot gel packs, and got it on first try, in a great location– first time that has ever happened for me, god bless sue!

My husband arrived just before they took me back, traffic was bad, but I got to see him before they took me into surgery. They gave me a shot of lovenox blood thinner and the relaxation med. I was feeling mellow. I was out like a light soon and then waking up in recovery.

They started on time at 8:30 and I was coming to in recovery at about 10:30. I stayed in recovery for an hour, during recovery, i was feeling sore, they kept upping the meds and added demerol because i was still feeling it pretty decently. That seemed to do it. they brought me up to my room and got me settled in and hooked up to my pain pump so I could just push a button when I needed more.

I walked once around the unit the first night and had a restless night. The early part of the night was hard, because I felt like I had to pee, and I had a catheter in! Turns out when the bag was drained at one point, the tubing got vapor locked so my bladder was really hurting and that was bouncing pain all around my gut. Once they got they figured out, I was able to get some sleep.

Doing the breathing and coughing is a bitch. The coughing in particular sucks.

My mouth is a dry wasteland. I am hoping they get me down for my swallow test soon so I can begin to sip, sip, sip! I am wondering what that will feel like. Kinda freaked, will it hurt?

My abdomen basically feels like I have done a zillion sit-ups. Yowch!!

Anyway, I am on the loser’s bench. My night nurse said they are probably going to want to push me out of here today, (my guess because the doc wants me crossed off before he leaves for vacation.) I however would like to stay my full two nights because my two youngest are going to want to be jumping on me and I would like to have one more day just to focus on me and recovery before I jump back into being a mama. I can actually sleep in the hospital, so am hoping I can get one more day.

It makes me nervous that I did have a hernia, as well. One more thing to leak or have complications with. Send positive vibes and prayers if you are so inclined? Thanks to my hubby, brother, local friends for faboo support, and Thanks #wls world for all the great support you have been offering, my twerps and the lovely folks at verticalsleevetalk.com have been AWESOME!

More soon.