The Journey Home

It is so good to be home, especially after the long painful journey to get here.

Like I had mentioned before, this whole surgery/hospital stay was a first for me.  I can’t even describe accurately the amount of pain I was in for the first 24 hours, it hurt to eat, to breathe, to move.  After the first night the doctors decided to hook me up to an IV morphine pump so I could administer pain meds as needed.  It took a few hours after being hooked up for the pain to become manageable.  In the mean time I had a few visitors to help distract me from how I felt.  Surprisingly, I was wide awake most of the day.  By the evening I had figured out how to “stay ahead” of the pain and that night was able to sleep in two-hour stretches.

The next morning all the doctors made their rounds.  They asked how I was feeling.  The pain was manageable and I felt, finally under control.  They wanted to take me off the IV pump and start me on oral pain medication to start me on the path to be able to go home.  I was feeling pretty good and was open to the transition.  The physical therapist came by and we went for a walk around the floor.  It was difficult to breathe while walking and I felt a little dizzy.  I was happy to be back in bed.  A little while later, lunch came.  I got about half my lunch eaten before the pain in my chest became unbearable.  They were going to do an IV dilaudid breakthrough for pain, but even that pain was unbearable.  They had to re-do my IV hook up which was very unpleasant every little touch to my body was too much.  They finally got the breakthrough in my system and I pretty much fell asleep a few minutes later.  Ironically, while all this was happening the anesthesiologist was asking me questions about my pain management just as I was falling asleep from the breakthrough.  I slept for a few hours and woke up feeling better.  The nurses monitored my pain through the night with various oral medications.

Friday morning.  I woke up feeling better, the pain was under control again.  The doctors made their rounds in the morning and we discussed if I felt well enough to go home.  I wanted to wait to see if I could get through lunch without another episode like yesterday.  They agreed and we waited.  The two things I was worried about causing pain were walking and eating.  Both of those activities had caused me lots of pain the past couple of days.  I made it through a short walk in the hallways and lunch with minimal pain.  By the time the doctors made their afternoon rounds, about 3pm, I was feeling pretty good.  The pain was manageable and I hadn’t had any spikes today.  So they began the discharge process.  By 7:30pm I was home.  Yay!!

R.B. was in bed with me the whole time.