Well, I'm at my parents' house, but close enough!
First of all, you guys ROCK! I am so grateful for this forum and to have so many wonderful, thoughtful people checking in on me. Your prayers and good vibes really helped me through this.
Second of all, Whitney is THE BEST "His Girl Friday!" Whit, thanks so much for being my point person, a great buddy, and such a good listener. It helped to no end to be able to talk to someone "on the outside" while I was stuck in the hospital, feeling confused and terrified of what was going to happen. When we go out to lunch, it's on me!!!
Third of all - let me wrap up the story for everyone: As you all know, I had an internal hernia repaired in the upper part of my abdomen. When the surgeons went in, they were finally able to take a peek and figure out why I had been feeling bad for so long and fix the problem. Turns out the hole that they repaired was almost the size of a silver dollar!
My intestines would get stuck and kinked up in there, but the hole was SO big that when I was admitted to the hospital on previous occasions, by the time they had cut off my food/water supply by mouth, the food I had previously would finally pass, the intestines would slip out of the hole, and voila! It would look clear on a CT scan. How frustrating is that?? Luckily this time (and I do mean luckily, because I don't even want to think about this problem going on any longer), the intestines became inflamed and thickened, and could no longer slip out of the hole, so it finally showed up.
The best news of all is that they only had to repair the hernia. Before I went into surgery, they wrote all these "possibilities" down on my consent to surgery form, including things like "possible open procedure," and "bowel resection." ACK! Even the doctors were relieved that, while my intestines were not happy campers, no section neccesitated removal.
I was released late Friday morning and since then have mostly been sleeping, letting my body try to heal itself, and avoiding my boss, whose audacity throughout this situation is so outrageous that if it wasn't so maddening, it would be funny. Not only did she suggest that I could put off the possibility of surgery (quote: "I have two hernias that I haven't had repaired. I'm sure it's not that serious. It's not a big deal; it could wait."), but kept me ON THE PHONE when the OR nurses came to get me for surgery ("I know they're there, but please just stay on the phone with me for a minute so I know what I'm doing"), and then had the utter GALL to tell me that I didn't take care of myself properly, ("I just don't understand why you wouldn't take care of this when you started feeling bad on the 21st, because I just can't do my job and your job and now I'm screwed.") As my boyfriend said when I told him that, "Gee, I'm so sorry my emergency surgery was inconvenient for YOU." I could go on and on, but I'm trying to let it go, because I need to heal. I won't even know when I can go back to work until I see the doctor next week, and she can just deal with it. I refuse to feel guilty over a serious emergency that no one could have possibly forseen or planned for.
But anyway, things are definitely looking sunnier now. I'm still in a lot of pain and my dad jokes that I look like the Hunchback of Notre Dame (I can't really stand up straight yet because of the pain), but I am SO HAPPY to have this problem fixed. I hated the frustration and the fear that was associated to any meal, the frustration that then extended to my boyfriend and my family, because I hurt and was irritated all the time because of the pain, and the confusion every time I would be SURE something was wrong, but the doctors couldn't find it. It's nice to know that I'm not nuts in that regard!!
In short, it wasn't exactly how I thought I was going to start my new year, but 2007 is looking a whole lot brighter now!
Thanks once again for all of your good thoughts and concern. It's good to be home to my forum family!
RACHEL
) PErhaps you can peruse the want ads while you are out and find someone that will treat you better! WELCOME HOME AND GET WELL SOON!
Van
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