Gall bladder surgery

Two days ago, my gall bladder was removed. It had been causing me almost constant belly aches for some 2 months, and occasional terrible cramp attacks due to being full of gall stones, and so surgery was the only option.

I had to come to the hospital at 7:30 am. Ron dropped me off, I went to the department, reported in and was rounded up with several other people in a room. There was a bit of confusion, apparently several people named "Smits", "Smit" or "Smid" were scheduled for surgery that day and the nurses were having a hard time keeping track of who was who. By 7:40 am I suddenly got told I was scheduled to be at the OR at 7:45 and so I had to change into a lovely blue hospital shirt very quickly, then was rushed there. When we arrived there was people holding clipboards and looking on computer screens all over the place, a whole row of beds with people in it ready to have surgery, and no space for me. The new computer system for the OR planning wasn't working too well, and so it wasn't really my turn yet, and I was brought back to the room I was previously in.

After waiting for another hour it finally was my turn, and so they took me to the OR for the second time that day. This time by volunteer workers from the "patient transportation" department. I told the man pushing my bed this was my second time to the OR today because something went wrong with the planning the first time. He jokingly responded "ah well, that's because the nurses brought you. Just leave it to us from patient transportation, we always make sure no one returns". I'm sure he meant well but at the time, I didn't think it was funny.

This time, I was accepted, the IV needle put in place and within a few minutes, I was under full anaesthesia. The first thing I remember after that is being in the recovery room at noon. I didn't have a lot of pain and apart from a bit dizzy and disoriented I felt quite good, so soon after I was back at the "short stay" department. I called home to let them know I was allright, logged into Yahoo for a moment to let a few other people know I was fine, and dozed off again, spending most of the afternoon dozing off and waking up again. The pain worsened, and I felt dizzier and by the end of the afternoon I got really sick. The nurse gave me two tablets of paracetamol and 5 minutes after taking them, I had to vomit and they came straight out again. Ron and the kids came to visit while I was still feeling terribly, so sick and in so much pain.. they left fairly soon and after they left I kept being sick multiple times, the vomitting worsening the pain from the wounds in my belly, driving it up to level "unbearable". The surgeon came to check on me and said she'd prescribe something against the sickness. For some reason, it took 2 hours for this medication to finally be administered, and so I spent another 2 hours hurting like hell and vomiting myself inside out.

Finally the vomitting stopped but by then the biggest one of my wounds had started to bleed again and using the button to call a nurse remained without a response for 5 minutes. And so I stumbled into the nurse's post, both hands pressed to my chest, blood dripping from my fingers, mumbling "ehm.. something's going wrong here". Later on I laughed about it, I probably looked like someone from a gangster movie at that point. "It was Tony's men.. they got me" or something similar. The nurse bandaged it up and the bleeding stopped, and so I went back to bed.

I asked the nurse to please give me something against the pain but she remained unmovable: I wasn't scheduled for more pain medication until 11 pm. Trying to explain the previous tablets had come straight out as I was being sick had no effect. By 11 I finally got 2 more tablets of paracetamol (effectively my first pain medication after the surgery) but by then I was in so much pain they didn't do much. I tried to sleep but couldn't and ended up sitting up against the pillows, half dozing off occasionally.

By 3 am the night nurse found me half crying and decided to give me a morphine shot. And as painful as the shot itself was.. I swear I was grinning like a total junkie when the godsent liquid entered my bloodstream and the pain lessened, finally.

The next day I was feeling a lot better. Still in a lot of pain but at least it was bearable. Not sick anymore, I even ate some bread for breakfast. The surgeon came to see me again and decided I was to go home.

That was yesterday and I spent it alternating between sleeping and sitting up for a bit. I went to bed early and slept fairly well and today, I am without pain as long as I sit still and breathe slowly. Still a bit drowsy and very weak, but all in all feeling a lot better.

Most of all, I'm just glad it's over. Now, it's just a matter of resting a lot and nursing myself back to full health.