Ouch, but Over

61 this morning, lovely, cool, low humidity. Ahhh.

Larry brought me flowers!

So, yesterday was the day to say goodbye to my troublesome gallbladder. I wasn't happy about it: for one thing, I dislike hospitals and pretty much everything else about the health care system. Not the people, mind. The people are good, kind, caring humans doing their best to help the recalcitrant people like me who put off getting things fixed as long as possible.

I suppose my aversion comes from my mother. God love her, she seemed to be always going to doctors, therapists, and hospitals. She even worked for quite a few years as a nurse's aide. She was fascinated by medical gadgets and happily took scads of meds. She did have good reason for some of this, as her health was not really good, but she often scared us with false alarms. 

More flowers from Larry. So pretty.

So maybe I can lay my reaction to all things medical on my mother, but that isn't fair is it? Perhaps it's more that before I was 6 i had had two pretty scary things happen to me that required emergency hospital care: one when I jumped from a swing and landed on an old metal coffee can, nearly cutting my leg off, and the other an emergency appendectomy. Maybe it was those things, like a person scared of dogs because of some early bad experience?

Anyway, we were up and out the door before 6am for the hour-plus drive to Thomas Memorial Hospital.  Once there, we sat. For an hour. Then I was taken to a room, got into a hospital gown, cap, etc. And sat, for almost another hour. All that rush to get there!

I don't even remember being taken to surgery. I sure remember waking up and hurting, with a very dry mouth. The pain wasn't really bad, probably due to some powerful drug. After I had recovered sufficient sense, the doc came in, said it went well, that my gallbladder was "a mess" and sure needed to come out, and that I could get dressed and go home after a nurse brought me two scripts, one for pain and one for nausea.

He also said I needed no special diet! That was good news. He said to just eat as we usually do since we already have a pretty good low-fat, veggie-filled diet.

Flowers I picked while Larry went to the store today, before he surprised me with his roses.

It was a restless night, waking every hour to get to the bathroom--apparently they fill you up with fluids for this surgery. But the dry mouth is gone, and I am only taking a half dose of the pain medication. I have done a few small chores, like washing dishes, sweeping, and folding laundry. Mostly I am just taking it easy, and having several naps. I expect I will do the same for the next couple days. 

The funny thing is that when I met with the surgeon to arrange this surgery, he told me I would have 3 small holes. But I seem to have 4. At least, there are 4 bandages.  So I wonder, could they not find my gallbladder and had to hunt around for it??? Just kidding, of course, but it is puzzling.

I am very grateful for the excellent and kind care I received, and thrilled to be finally rid of that gallbladder. Maybe I am finally getting over my irrational dislike for medical stuff! This little rose from my garden is for them, with my heartfelt thanks.

Copyright Susanna Holstein. All rights reserved. No Republication or Redistribution Allowed without attribution to Susanna Holstein.