T-Minus 21

Some of my regular readers (all one, maybe two of you), already know that I have a gynecological condition called Adenomyosis. I won’t go into detail about what it is here (because I kind of already have), and  you can find that here, and here. But I can attest that this condition is a painful and very annoying pain in the ass. Literally.

(Holy Shit the weather man is at the playground right now. He is so much taller than he seems on TV!)

Anyway. I have had chronic pain and other fun stuff for several years now and had talked to my old doctor about treatment options when I was first diagnosed. The only definitive treatment is hysterectomy, and at that point I was just diagnosed and the pain wasn’t too bad, so I decided to wait. Since then, my old doctor retired and now I have a new doctor. When I saw him for the first time in the fall of 2007, he confirmed that my best option for a “cure” was hysterectomy. Then when I saw him his past fall, he said, “Call me when you are tired of dealing with the pain.”

(OMG … the weatherman’s son just came over and stood behind me. My Race For The Cure shirt has the network logo on it because they were a sponsor and his son recognized it. Hysterical)

I digress. Again. I made an appointment and saw my doc last week. I have had enough of this shit and I’m not gonna take it anymore! I didn’t say that exactly, but I did say that I was done and wanted all those troublesome parts taken out of me once and for all. He did a quick exam (ouch) and we discussed some stuff and he left me to put my pants back on. When he came back in he sat down and kind of shook his head and said , “You need a hysterectomy.” Like that was some grand revelation or something. No shit Sherlock. Then he pulled out his PDA and we started talking dates. I want to get it done as soon as possible and he agreed, so he put me in his calender for June 10th. He said he’d need to check with the hospital to make sure that there were no conflicts with other surgeons, but he was pretty sure that it was far enough out that June 10 would be our date.

(I just realized that all this time I thought this weatherman was gay. Go figure.)

Enough of the digressing. After we picked our date, he started going into more detail about the actual procedure. I realize now that even though I was prepared to go in there and say: “take my woman parts out,” I still wasn’t really, REALLY prepared for the reality of this situation. I know this because there are major parts of the conversation we had that I do not remotely remember. I think he told me he would do a “Total Hysterectomy” but I can be certain. And only after doing some research on a AWESOME website (more on that later) do I understand that there are multiple kinds of hysterectomies that can be done. So it seems I have a few questions for my pre-op appointment.

Our next discussion was really just him reading off the surgical consent form and going over all of the risks and such for this surgery. Now, I have had a couple of outpatient surgeries already in my lifetime. Two on my eyes and one other laparoscopy, which is when all this mess was diagnosed. I was under and out for all of these but they were outpatient, so I was in and out in the same day. For some reason, my addled brain didn’t expect this to be much different. Some different yes, but not much. I also need to say that I have already posted all of the steps necessary to perform one kind of hysterectomy during a particular bad month, so I knew a lot of what the surgery entailed, but again, clueless when it came right down to it. He said things like “blood clots” and “compression stockings” and “infection” and “lots of blood” and “complications” and I started to freak out the tiniest bit. Complications could include things like making an error when they are removing my ureters from my uterus. And I’m pretty sure I need those ureters to function daily. So I’m hoping for no complications.

I left the office and was surpsised at how shell-shocked I was. I didn’t cry, but I did think about it. I was literally shaking for a brief time, while driving back to work. By the time I got back to my office, my brain was a big pile of mush. There was no more working for me this day. I could not concentrate on anything. I couldn’t get ahold of D for what seemed like forever and when we finally did talk, some of the shock had subsided, but that conversation brought it all back. And do you want to know my biggest issues? Guilt.

Sometimes I think I’m an old Jewish mother trapped inside this body. I felt horribly guilty. Guilty that I was going to have to be off work for 4 weeks and would have to leave my co-worker to the wolves and crazy patients. Guilty that I would not be able to be mom and do the mom stuff around the house that I do, little as it may be. Guilty that I was going to miss a HUGE chorus rehearsal and education weekend with my guys, not to mention the regular weekly rehearsals I’d not be there to help out. What the hell is wrong with me!?

Since then, my co-worker and manager and director at work have been extremely supportive and encouraging that I take the full time recommended by my doctor. My awesome husband changed his plans and is going to miss nearly all of this annual education weekend that he usually teaches at so that he can be with me the day of and first two days after my surgery. Everyone was very reassuring and understanding and now I feel …. excited. I’m actually excited. About major surgery. I have some fear and worry, but I’m focusing on the fact that my pain may completely, or at least partially, go away. This oversized uterus will be out of me (Here’s a big bonus that comes with this condition: a uterus that is swollen to three times the normal size. Awesome). I will get 4 weeks off work to recover, and one of those weeks will be spent with all my friends and my family in California. I’m going into this looking at it as if it is a sort of vacation. I’ll get an extra “all expenses paid” night in the hosptial (more on that later too) to boot. So. Today is T-Minus 21. Here we go!!