Tags
Dad, family, fibroids, getting better, I am loved, Indy, Mai, Mariah, Mom, sick, surgery, The Duchess
St. Justin Martyr
I have been spending a fair chunk of my evening sending various bits of reassurance out into the internets – emailing coworkers, etc. to let them know that I am ok. This is the first time I’ve had a little energy to spare for such endeavors, which is a good measure of what the last week or so has been like. While I am about it, I thought I would let you dear readers also know that I am still alive and kicking, and as far as we can tell, quite robustly on the mend!
My surgery was Wednesday, and the days leading up to it were pretty dire. I started bleeding again two weekends ago, and no matter how many iron supplements I took, by last weekend I couldn’t stand up for more than a few minutes at a time without getting all wobbly and woozy. I continued to work the whole last week, partly because I needed to train my replacement, partly because I didn’t think I could afford to miss the work hours, and partly from sheer stubbornness. Yeah, it’s a curse.
This led to a situation where my family did not quite realize how bad off I was until I showed up to the Memorial Day cookout, and couldn’t walk into the kitchen to get my own food. However, once my family understood how things were, they pitched in amazingly. Mom and Indy undertook to make sure I had meals, Mariah and The Duchess came over to help me clean, and even Dad helped me do laundry. By Tuesday night, the house was looking in pretty good order. On Wednesday morning, Indy came over to help me pack up my essentials, and Mom and Dad escorted me to the hospital for my procedure.
The surgery itself went well. My doctor was able to remove both the original fibroid we’ve been dealing with, and another smaller fibroid that had been hiding behind the first one. He said that everything looked good, and he thinks it should heal quite nicely and be nearly good as new. They kept me overnight after the surgery, as we had expected. However, when they tested my hemoglobin levels the next morning, they were alarmingly low (6.5 – even lower than when all this started last October). So I spent most of Thursday getting a blood transfusion in one arm with a morphine pump hooked up to the other.
On the bright side, the blood transfusion made me feel better than I had for days. Thursday afternoon I was able to go to the bathroom under my own steam (it’s the little things), and Thursday night they let me have a real dinner. After a quiet night, they agreed that I could be released into the care of my family, and Friday afternoon Dad came to take me home.
So here I am, safely in the bosom of my family. They are taking excellent care of me. Mom and Indy have been keeping my water cup full, and making delicacies to tempt my appetite. On Friday night when my temperature spiked, Dad had a chance to literally “wipe my fevered brow.” Dad is also the one who made sure to bring the Eucharist home to me from Mass this weekend.
Myself, I have mostly been doing my best impression of a limp noodle. Yesterday my big accomplishment was getting myself cleaned up and into clean clothes. Today I did that, plus visiting with Mai and her sweet baby, and now sending out emails. Even though Indy set up a lovely nest for me upstairs (complete with flowers at the head of the bed, a fluffy rug on the floor beside it, and supports over the bed so I can pull myself up without using my injured abdominal muscles), I’m still on the couch downstairs, right about where I plopped down as soon as I walked in the door Friday. Maybe tomorrow I’ll make the move.
So little by little I’m getting better. I have grand plans of more blogging to come. I have the most ridiculously glorious wedding invitations to show you (Indy has outdone herself), and a few little projects I’ve been working on, plus maybe now I can seize the opportunity to write about something besides my health (the idea!). Things are looking up!