... so tell I must. But first, let me share a pic of my piece of cake which I made from my fave kitchen.
It's moist with just the right hint of cinnamon and the tropical flavour of pineapple bits in it. It is best to leave it overnight in the fridge for the flavour to intensify a bit. Have it with a cup of tea, coffee, or whatever your palate prefers.
Okay, so on to the tale....
I had a procedure done last week. It's a bit major, which requires 6 weeks for me to fully recover physically. I am off work while I try to recover, not that I do anything physical in the office. Unless you consider series of meetings to be physical enough hahaha. But the way things are going, I don't think I will need the full 6 weeks. Let's see.
I was my surgeon's first patient for the day. I was told she had 3 that day. Truth be told, I was not too anxious about the surgery. I know it's something done to hundreds of thousands of patients a year. But on the day of the surgery, while I was on the "holding dock" waiting for that moment when they'd put me to lalaland, anxiety took over. During the wait, 3 people (a nurse and 2 resident doctors) had re-assured me they'll take care of me. I prayed.
The sight and voice of my surgeon calmed me down. They then asked me to walk to the operating room. All I could remember was seeing this vast stark room with a bed in the middle. There must be around 10 people in that room wearing blue coats. When I lied down, my surgeon briefed me of what's about to happen and that I will hear them talk about me. It will be all about me.
When they started hooking me up to some instrument, I remember one resident doctor offered me her hand to hold. After several pokes (no not the kind you get in FB-land) and a painful one on my back, off to lalaland I went. I went to the hospital that morning ready for that happy thought I'd bring with me to the lalaland.
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| one of the stops during our cruise to the Bahamas |
I was told ahead that the surgery will last for 3 hours. I don't know how long I was in the recovery room before I woke up to the sound of 2 nurses talking about their vacation to some beautiful beaches. It may be something scripted but to be honest, I was just grateful I woke up. Then I realized I was still hooked up to some metal thingie-majiggs: IV on my left wrist, oxygen on my nose, BP monitor on my right arm. Before I doze off again, every some minutes, the sphygmomanometer magically tightened my arm and then annoyingly beeped. Apparently it did that to alarm the nurses because my BP was quite high. The nurse came, checked on my BP reading, did something (I didn't know what). That must have taken place for hours. All I could remember were the annoying beeps. Then someone was wheeled in, placed right beside the empty bed next to mine. She was hysterical. I was a bit annoyed. Not to her hysterics but to the constant beeps. I couldn't wait to be out of the recovery room, see MDH, and be in the privacy of my hospital room and let nature and my body took their course to recovery-land.
Later that day, my surgeon came to check up on me and told me everything went very smoothly during the procedure. She's the expert, I'm the patient. Everything she said that day were very re-assuring.
Before the anesthesia wore out, I was given some painkillers. And that was the start of the biggest scare of my life. In an attempt to do some short walks, my nurse let me sat down on a chair and waited a bit. After a few minutes of sitting there, I felt weird. It was as if what's left of the energy in me was sucked out and very strangely, everything faded away. I asked MDH to keep talking as I could barely hear what he said. He sang me a song while waiting for the nurses to come. It felt like I was inside a fridge, or out there in the snow and not have anything on to protect me from the cold. One of the nurses (there were 3 of them that time) told me to breathe in... breathe out... and to imagine I was in a beach and surrounded by the warm breeze. I felt the warmth, not from the breeze but from the warm blanket they put around me. I heard one of the nurses blurted out "it's not looking good." I really thought I was a goner that day. Thankfully, here I am, in the comforts of our home, in front of this "fruit." MDH has been working from home to keep me company and has been generous with his TLCs ;). I can't ask for more.
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| An apple a day drives the doctor away.... I got this fruit on Valentine's day btw. |
I'm hoping I will be able to recover as quickly as possible. One of the things the nurses told me to do before I had my procedure was to take a high-protein snack the night before. Apparently, this helps. What also helps is pain management. The quicker I try to get into my regular activities, the quicker the healing is. It is important to alleviate (if not eliminate) the pain so it does not discourage/stop me from trying to get back to my normal routine. I stopped taking "that" painkiller. Instead I'm taking Tylenol One. It's been good.
I have so many things I want to do while I try to recover at home. One of them is to plan our three-week trip to Europe this summer. And maybe write some more in this blog. We'll see.
