Surgery is finally behind me

I know it's been a long time since I wrote, but I am just starting to feel like myself. The night before my surgery I didn't sleep at all, we were up at 3am and on the road by 4am. I was the first person to check in for surgery once we got to the VG. I sat in a corner in my Johnny shirt and hat waiting nervously to move to the operating room. Around 7am or 7:30am they introduced me to the residents and my OR nurse and told me it was time to head to the OR. Moyal walked me to the doors, I was shaking like a leaf and Moyal had tears welling up in his eyes. He kissed me and then I went through the doors. I never wanted to run more than I did right then. I got up on the stretcher/bed and they started trying to get an IV in me. It's never easy to get an IV in me, my veins are miserable. While they are poking me they are trying to decide what they are going to do with my legs for the surgery because my knees don't bend and normally you have your knees bent up in stirrups, but I wasn't able to do that. They called Dr. McIntyre into the OR and thought they would keep me awake to get me in position, but, thank GOD he said " No, put her to sleep". It was right after that I was gone.....................When I woke up in the recovery room, I don't remember feeling pain, I actually don't remember feeling much of anything. It seemed like time was standing still. As it turned out I was in there for a very long time. It was suppertime before they moved me to a room. I remember seeing Moyal when I was in the hallway of 9B waiting to go into my room. He had spent from early that morning until then waiting for me and the nurses made him wait even longer until they get me situated in my bed. I remember thinking, " how am I going to get into a different bed when I can't even lift my head?" Well, they put a backboard under me and lifted it and plopped me on the other bed and then pulled the backboard out. After doing my vitals they Moyal in, Annette and Mom came in to see me and then they left right away. I don't really remember those first few days, except Moyal was always there. Early in the morning helping me get cleaned up until late at night when I was ready to sleep, ( not that I didn't sleep through the day while he was there too).Surgery was on a Friday and I think it was early on Sunday morning when the resident came in to see me I was so nauseated I couldn't breathe. He told me I would need an NG tube. Well I didn't know what that was but I needed relief. The nurses came in with this tube and a glass of water with an elbow straw. One nurse stuck the straw in my mouth and said "drink" while the other nurse proceeded to feed this tube in my nose and down my throat. Not pleasant, especially when it got stuck halfway and she had to reposition it to get it in the right spot. This tube then gets attached to a very noisy machine and sucks the green bile out of my stomach. It was really gross, a litre came off in no time and just kept coming. I thought at first it was going to be pulled later that day and I could start trying to have some fluids, boy was I wrong. I had that tube down my throat for 8 days. On the last day I was allowed to have a Popsicle. It was the first thing I had to eat in 12 days. During those 8 days I developed an external infection in my incision and the doctor had to open it to let it drain and then the dressing needed to be changed a few times a day. The holes would be packed with gauze and lots of it, it grossed me out so bad, it hurt too. I had dalotted hooked up to a push button, so I would push my button a few times before the dressing change to get a little relief. After a few days they thought my ostomy wasn't working the way it should so they sent me for a CT scan and found that I had a blockage. Just when I thought I couldn't be shocked by what they do to my body, the doctor pulled out a catheter that he was planning to put in my stoma and through my intestine. I thought I would pass out just at the thought. As it turned out it didn't hurt and it did work on the blockage. It took a few days but it finally slowed down to close to normal output. Every night I was in there I would have hot and cold sweats. It was aweful, I would wake up drenched and freezing, my temperature was up and down all the time. After about 5 days with the tube down my throat one of the nurses seemed to think I was still expelling way too much bile so she had the doctor order an x-ray to see if the tube was down too far. It wasn't until the next day that they came and told me indeed it was down 10cm too far, so they pulled it up 10cm. I remember having a really bad day on the Thursday after surgery, I had company that day, Stew had come in the afternoon and Mike and Shelley were there in the evening. Quinten had taken the day off school to come in and visit with me, luckily he was asleep in the afternoon when I started throwing up the green bile, even with the tube down my throat. That is a taste I never what to experience again. So finally after 15 days in hospital they finally let me go home. I was so home sick at that point all I could do is cry even though I was packing to go home.