One Last Look Ahead

Well, this is it.

After 5 months and 90 blog posts, this is the last post I will make before the day of my surgery (July 25, 3 days from today.)

On Monday, at 7:30 AM (MST), I will get taken back to pre-op, and within a couple of hours, my whole life will change. Again. After 80% of my stomach is removed, I will get moved out to the general population of the hospital for a couple of days. There, I will sleep or shuffle slowly back and forth around the hallways, hauling my IV rack around behind me. Until, on Wednesday, they send me home, where I will collapse into a real bed for about a week or so.

Where am I getting this vision of the future from? I just watched Lor go through it, about 5 weeks ago. It took her three weeks to really get her feet back under her, and I know darn well she is tougher than I am. I am resigned to some quality bed time post-surgery.

I will continue to keep everyone informed as usual - my next blog post will be from the hospital, either immediately pre- or post-surgery. Let's go with "pre". Lord only knows what I would say if I wrote something immediately after surgery. Anesthesia can do some strange stuff to the mind.

How do I feel about it? A mixture of dread and relief. Dread because I hate hospitals sooo much. Relief because I will at least be done with waiting. Lor even informs me that I will be done with feeling like I am constantly starving, so there is that to look forward to. 

Curiously, I am not afraid of the procedure itself. We have picked some amazingly competent surgeons in a world-class organization focused exclusively on bariatric surgery. After some of the horror stories we have heard and read about these procedures being performed by less experienced doctors, we are so glad that ABQ Health Partners Bariatrics was available to us.

I am, admittedly, kinda worried about the "5 shanks and a boot knife" results, but 5 weeks out Lor is already rocking and rolling with pretty much full use of her core muscles, so I suppose I have real evidence in front of me that it isn't as bad as it looked. 'Cause boy, did it look bad.

Mainly, I am ready to get home on Wednesday, so I can lie around and binge-watch all the shows I have been stacking on Netflix, and go through my old DVD collection. 

I will keep everyone in the loop as things progress. Only 72 hours to go.

Ready For That Tasty Hospital Food,

- Hawkwind