Day of Surgery!

So my surgery was set for 10/10/12. Two days prior, I had to do some pre-surgery bloodwork (aka... a pregnancy test).

My stepmom came down the day before my surgery to help me out. She lives in Michigan and I live in Kentucky. We have no family close by, and with having an almost 1 year old and an almost 3 year old.... we need the extra hands. Knowing that the recovery was going to be rather hellacious (Dr. Kempiners confirmed this himself), I knew that I would need all of the help I could get!

10/10/12 rolled around. Comfy clothes and my mom accompanied me to the surgery center that morning. I was thrilled to find out that the surgery would be in a surgery center, as opposed to the hospital. I just wasn't fond of the idea of having to navigate through a huge hospital when being all drugged up and in copious amounts of pain.

The process was extremely smooth. I got there and immediately checked it. They informed me that I was their oldest patient of the day (at the ripe old age of 26). The nurse brought me back and did a quick history and verified all of my information.
I got undressed and was put up in a comfy recliner with a heated blanket while waiting.

Dr. Kempiners came out and spoke to my mom and I before bringing me back. He immediately made me feel at ease and ready to go (despite reading entirely too many horror stories the night before).

I said a quick goodbye to my mom and they brought me back to the OR. I got hooked up to my IV and was put under with a gas mask. It went very quickly- the only thing that irritated me was that they lied to me about "it's just oxygen you'll be breathing in"..... pssh. Nope. I work in the medical field, I know that I'm breathing in more than just oxygen. But whatever. I was out anyway haha :)

I woke up in the recovery room. I have no clue how I got there, but I was back to being on a comfy recliner and a warm blanket. My mom was there. They told me that the surgery went well- obviously my tonsils were removed, they removed some adenoid tissue, and removed and reinserted a new tube in my ear that was plugged. The surgery itself was about 45 minutes, and then I slept a good 45 minutes in recovery before they woke me up.

I woke up extremely happy. I was in zero pain. I remember I was introducing myself to all of the recovery room nurses. They brought me over a popsicle and some sprite to drink and I easily took that. The nurses informed me that I was by far the happiest patient they'd ever had, which made me feel good. They said usually people were crying shortly after waking up.

They made me sit there for another hour or so before letting me go home. I easily walked out to the car. We had to stop by the pharmacy to get my liquid percocet and antibiotic. I went in and had no issue sitting there waiting for the 20 minutes or so while they filled it.

We headed back home after that. I got to the surgery center at 9:30, and we got home a little after 1 that afternoon. So all-in-all, it wasn't that long.

I was up the rest of the day. My mom and husband kept insisting that I lay down, and I attempted to follow that rule, but I am just too much of a busy body. I was diligent about taking my 1 tsp of percocet every 4 hours, which I know helped. I immediately started eating popsicles and drinking lots of ice cold water through a straw when I got home.

That evening rolled around and I was rather hungry at this point. I was able to eat pasta noodles with some margarine and grated cheese without a problem.

I did start experiencing some slight discomfort upon swallowing, but it just felt like a sore throat. Nothing I hadn't already experienced before. My worst pain was actually in my ear- more specifically, the ear that they replaced the tube. Just felt a lot of pressure which was annoying but went away.

My first night went swimmingly. I slept propped up in bed, and made sure that I got up and took my narcotic at the 4 hour mark. The only issue I had was when I apparently, in my sleep, moved off from being propped up and was flat. I did wake up with the worst of my pain when that happened- but after propping back up I was back to fine fairly quickly.

So far... so good!