It's done!

At this point, I'm back in the hotel, flopped on the bed, watching "Two and Half Men" with my husband.  Life actually seems a bit normal right now...well, except for the extraordinary amount of painkillers on-board and the fact I look 6 months pregnant!!

The surgery itself was like a dream.  I arrived at St. Paul's at 630 am, got registered, weighed, changed, and was in the day patient area by 715.  Into the operating room by 745.  Interestingly, before the surgeons got in there, it was an all-female team of nurses and anaesthesiologists.  We were laughing and joking as I drifted off to sleep. 

Amazingly, my 4 hour surgery only took 2 1/2hrs.  The doctors said that they spend a lot of time dissecting out the arteries and veins, but in my case, they were almost ready to go!  I wonder if all that prayer prepared my vessels for the surgery.  I suggested this and got funny looks from the doctors.  :)

Later that day, I had some bleeding from my horizontal incision (close to my underwear line) and the nurse snagged a surgeon to peek at it and give his opinion.  I was feeling quite embarrassed and shy about showing him my naked tummy and "everything", but then I realized that he was one of the doctors who'd been in there.  Well, gee whiz!  You've already seen it all!

I met at least 3 surgeons that were in on the operation:  Dr Eng, Dr Mike and Dr Mason.  Dr Eng is serious and quiet - the apparently boss of the team.  Dr Mike is young, the nurses didn't know his last name, but I asked and it's Metcalf.  Apparently he's a third-generation urologist.  And Dr Mason was the one who checked on me the most and seemed the most involved in my case.  Not that I'm complaining - whoo hoo!  What a cutie!

The view from my recovery room at St Paul's.   You can see into the other wings of the 5th, 6th and 7th floors.  From the other part of the room, you could see the city and the mountains.

There's a white board on the wall in the hospital room where the nurse writes her name and the goals for the day.  Yesterday it said, "control pain, get ambulatory" and today it said "home today".  What a nice thing to see!!  I know it's hard to read, but it was special to me.

After surgery I had tubes coming out every which place, but ny dinnertime yesterday I was off the IV and PCA pump, off the catheter and back to normal.  It made for an interesting and painful night of running to the bathroom, but look at me now!!  I'm proud to say that in the last 24 hours I've been feeling a lot better and almost human again.  A shower in the morning will do wonders, but other than that I'm just tired and tender. 

And back to the belly thing.  I have three little incisions on my left-side and a bigger one in the bottom of my tummy.  The incisions haven't been too bad, but they're very swollen.  I can see my profile in the closet mirrored doors and I look 6 months pregnant!  Too funny!  Can't wait til that passes. 

So to all my friends, thank you for your prayers and positive thoughts.  I really believe that it has made a difference in my recovery and that it helped the surgery to go so well.  Best wishes and see you soon!