Post op mile
stone:
Last night,
for the first time since surgery, I slept through the night. I was asleep before midnight. And I woke up only
because some inconsiderate jerk left the bathroom light on and
it was shining in my eyes!
Of course I
felt a little foolish when I realized that, noooo, I was facing away from the bathroom and I was in fact
turned toward the window.
The SUN was
shining in my face! I had slept through
until the sun was high enough to shine IN MY FACE! That just does NOT happen. EVER! Even pre-surgery!
Granted, I DID
have the help of a full pain pill last night.
Took half at 9:00pm and the second half at 11:00pm. That is the most I
have had in days. So it pretty well knocked me out. But I will take it. I know
my body needs that sleep.
********
********
Two steps
forward…maybe (NOT) 2 steps back:
There is a
chance I will experience a setback. And I won’t lie, I am a bit nervous. If I
let myself dwell, I get scared. I
believe I am having issues from the nicked ureter and stent. This has me worried. Of course after realizing it was probably
stent issues, I decided to look up information on the topic and discovered this:
Authors: Sandip P Vasavada, MD,
Raymond Rackley, MD, Jeffrey B Garris, MD, Francisco Talavera, PharmD, PhD,
Michel E Rivlin, MD, J Stuart Wolf Jr, MD, FACS , Bradley Fields Schwartz, DO,
FACS
“Ureteral injury is one of the most serious complications of
gynecologic surgery. Less common than injuries to the bladder or
rectum, ureteral injuries are far more serious and troublesome and are often
associated with significant morbidity, the formation of ureterovaginal
fistulas, and the potential loss of kidney function, especially when recognized
postoperatively. For these reasons, injuries to the urinary tract, particularly
the ureter, are the most common cause for legal action against gynecologic
surgeons.
Despite the close
anatomical association between the female reproductive organs and the ureter,
injury to the ureter is relatively uncommon. Nevertheless, when a ureteral
injury does occur, quick recognition of the problem and a working knowledge of
its location and treatment are essential in providing patients with optimal
medical care.”
This last
little bit “quick recognition of the problem and
a working knowledge of its location and treatment are essential in providing
patients with optimal medical care” DOES make me very hopeful.
They knew RIGHT away when it happened and called the urologist in to
stitch and stent me up.
The most
serious cases come when they do not realize the ureter was damaged to begin
with and the woman goes home…only to come back to the ER days later, septic and
on the verge of losing a kidney. This obviously is
NOT my case.
Right now my
main concern is will I have to have a stent long term? (meaning months or
years?) The stent is fairly uncomfortable and the ½ pain pill I take seems to
be the only thing that really dulls that. To put it in perspective, it is
nearly as uncomfortable as my bad cramping from the endo. Not a sharp pain. But
constant, strong, dull pain/pressure.
IF I do have to do this long term, will it affect
getting back to running? I have plans to PR my 5K and 10K times in 2014. Will it cause sex to be painful? Will the constant discomfort of the stent
cause my drive to go down?? I have plans to PR in that area, too! (I know, I
know. At this point, I should not be concerned with this. I am not even supposed
to think about sex for another four
and half weeks.) My constant discomfort from the endo caused me to suffer academically
last semester. I am VERY concerned about that. I have been looking forward to
going back to school in January and kicking some GPA ass. So the thought of THIS interfering with school
is really starting to piss me off.
I firmly
believe that knowledge is power. So, I can’t just “let it go” and “not worry
about it” until I see the doctor. But I also know, one can get carried away
when reading “horror” stories about worst case scenarios. I want to learn all I can about this and what
*I* can do as the patient to turn this into a BEST case scenario. And not give
myself nightmares thinking about all the “what ifs.”
I discovered
this site a bit ago and am finding it very helpful in explaining how things
work, what I should look for, and what to expect while having the stent.
I am trying
to stay hopeful that after everything heals, this will be the end of it and no more
issues will come up. And trying to stay OUT of the mindset that I might have just traded one problem in for a different
one.
So, I leave you with this:
“I don’t believe in the
no-win scenario.”
LOL, that Kobayashi Maru label is going to get you some very confused visitors in the future I bet.
ReplyDeleteI know. Was that mean of me?
Delete