Nightmare at Davis (Part 1)

I had back surgery last week.  Now there’s a sentence I could have lived my whole life without ever wanting to write.  After my hysterectomy two years ago I promised myself I would never have surgery again, but with the doctor telling me I was risking paralysis and loss of bladder and bowel control, I thought it would be prudent to reconsider.  I hope it was the right decision.  

The surgery seemed to go okay.  I didn’t get an infection and I can move all my extremities and control my bodily functions - so hey, who am I to complain.  My left leg isn’t working quite up to snuff, but I can walk without a limp and I’m hoping that soon I will be back to mostly normal.  I may never jump on the trampoline again, or ride a horse, which are two things I enjoy, but life goes on.  

I had my surgery at Davis Hospital, which is a smaller local hospital.  It wasn’t my first choice, but that is where my surgeon has rights.  I would have preferred McKay-Dee, and I even tried to get an appointment with a surgeon who does work there, but he had a waiting list of over a month for a consultation and it seemed like time was of the essence.  I had two grandsons born and Davis, and both deliveries went well, so I figured it would be fine.  

I had done all the pre-op stuff the day before, so check-in at the hospital went well.  In no time at all I was in the paper gown with my IV running.  There was some confusion over whose turn it was to go next, and my anesthesiologist told me he’d been called back on his way home to do my surgery, but he was pleasant about it.  Soon I was wheeling down the hall to the last surgery suite.  An OR nurse put a mask over my face and I remember wondering what the flow rate was because I couldn’t feel it at all.  Meanwhile the anesthesiologist put two things into my IV that stung on their way in. I resisted the urge to ask him what size ETT tube he was going to use and how many ml/kg he would ventilate me at.  I thought I showed amazing restraint.

Next thing I knew I was awake and wishing I weren’t.  I hurt pretty bad and my wonderful nurse, Nadine, was hurrying to offer chemical relief.  My mother was also there.  Dave had left to switch cars with my daughter.  As my mom and Nadine arranged the bed covers for me they both were startled, and no doubt horrified, to discover that I had a pair of DIRTY men’s underpants in the bed with me.  Not what a woman wants to find in her bed when she’s been unconscious for 2 hours.

Nadine vowed to get to the bottom of it (ha ha),and she and my mother changed my sheets.  I was quickly distracted by the need to avoid vomiting in the supine position.  I hate surgery.