So Tuesday morning 6 am, Uncle Marc comes over to do the morning routine of getting the kids up, dressed, fed, and off to camp. Today was their first Field Trip day. They were going to Cantigny, so they were all excited about getting to camp. Hopefully they behaved for Uncle Marc!
Shawn and I got to St. Joe's by 6:30, and got checked in to the Outpatient Surgery floor. I was taken back to my "room", took care of some paperwork, paid the bill, got my IV, and was rolled back to the surgery waiting room by 7:15. At 7:20 I saw Dr. Dworsky, who went over what he was going to do, and he signed my right hip so that he and I knew he'd be working on the correct body part. (LOL) Next up, I spoke with two anesthesiologists who went through some more basics and told me what to expect with the anesthesia. The second anesthesiologist put a sedative in my IV to take the edge off, and said it would work within 30-60 seconds. I didn't feel any different though. Immediately following the sedative, I was rolled back to the operating room. That was sometime between 7:30 and 7:45 am. Surgery was supposed to start at 8 am, and being the first patient, I guess they were going to start early.
This OR was nothing like the birthing OR. The birthing OR was nice...sterile...but nicely painted, nice ceilings, nice equipment. This OR seemed drab, I recall weird stainless ceiling grates, and I really didn't get a chance to look around much. The only people in the room was the nurse that rolled my bed and the anesthesiologist. I moved from the bed to the table, and was immediately given the mask and order to "take deep breaths". Within 10 breaths it was lights out for me!
Coming out of anesthesia in the recovery room was weird. It was like a movie. Everything seemed to be moving much too fast. The nurses looking in at me seemed to have awfully large heads, and my head was spinning. The first thing I saw was a big, blue number 5 on the wall in front of me. I was in recovery stall 5. I could tell there were other patients around me, but my head felt so heavy that I couldn't even turn my head to look around. I recall knowing that I had been through surgery, and I was aware that I was coming out of the anesthesia, and I remember trying to fight the effects of it. As I struggled to make sense of things, the drugs did their thing, and I was in and out of consciousness for probably over an hour. The first thing I recall saying to my nurse was, "What time is it?" She had said that it was 12:15. I was panicked. Surgery was supposed to be 1.5-2 hours, and recovery was about an hour. That puts me at 10:30 or 11 am tops. So what went wrong?!? I asked the nurse what time I had gotten out of surgery. She said 11:16. So that meant that it did take an hour to come out of the fog. But I still don't know why the actual surgery took much longer than anticipated. I will have to find that out on my follow-up visit on Friday.
The nurse took my vitals, checked if I could move my toes, asked me to speak, etc. I remember FREEZING, actually teeth-chattering FREEZING, and the nurse brought me a few warm blankets and said that it was the meds making me cold. As things got more clear for me, I remember trying to lift my right leg. I could move my toes and feet but lifting it up wasn't happening. My hip itself seemed fine. I felt no pain there. I lifted the blanket and could see the gauze bandage over my hip, but it felt completely numb. Then I noticed that my voice was horse and terribly sore. Ah, that was from the intubation! My brain was working...I felt like a detective asking myself questions and figuring out the answers.
The next thing that happened was the nerve pain running all along the front of my thigh. It was excruciating! I've had that pain before, and usually shifting my position helps to alleviate that pain. So I tried to shift around, but being numb and half-witted, it was difficult to do. I asked the nurse if she could help me shift, and she helped, but the pain was still there. Nurse Mary (it was her birthday today) could tell I was in pain, and asked me where I was at on the pain scale. I gave her an 8 or maybe a 9, and she pumped me with some sort of IV pain medication. Over the next period of time (I'm not sure how long it was) nurse Mary and I did this little dance: the pain in my leg would come back, she'd shoot me up some pain meds, I'd drift off to sleep, my O2 sats would dip to 86%, the monitor would go off, I'd startle awake, Mary would tell me to take deep breaths, my O2 % would come back up and we'd start the whole cycle over again.
I heard Mary on the phone with Shawn, telling him that I was in recovery and that she needed to get my pain under control before I went back to a room. I learned later that I had 3 injections of IV pain meds and 2 Norcos before my pain was under control. I think I got back to a room at about 1:30. Once there, Shawn was able to join me. He told me that Dworsky talked to him after the surgery. Dworsky said that the labrum was being impinged but there were no tears and it was not detached. That's great news! He also said there was no sign of arthritis (he thought there was a bit of arthritis from the MRI/xray). Even better news! So all he did was shave and contour the ball and socket to give my hip more mobility. There was quite a bit of bone spur built up to the point of it being bone-on-bone. He trimmed back the labrum that was being impinged. Since that was all that was done, I'd be able to be partial weight-bearing on the crutches. More great news!
So back to the room: I got this pretty cool ICEMAN machine. So no need to use my Pinterest moldable ice pack that I made the other day. This thing keeps me cool without all the watery mess. It also stays at a nice temperature. It's been on my hip, and will continue to be on my hip any time I'm not walking around. The nurse went over my discharge orders with me. I was able to get dressed, and the physical therapist came up to show me what partial weight-bearing meant with crutches. I had to crutch out of the room, down the hall and go up and down some steps. I was amazed at how decent I felt with very little pain. I was stiff. I had to keep reminding myself that I still had a lot of pain meds in me and I still had a local anesthetic on my hip. And doc kept telling me that day 2 and day 3 would be the worst days.
So after my visit with PT, Shawn left to swap the car for the van and to pick up the kids. Meanwhile, I was all dizzy from my walk and was hungry. The nurse brought me 4 saltines and 2 cookies. It took me a half hour to eat them because my throat was so sore. The little bit of food did take away my light-headedness. And a little after 4:00 Shawn was back to St. Joe's to pick me up.
Of course the kids had a million questions. Some legitimate, some silly.
Holly: "Why are you talking all weird, Mommy?"
Me: "Because my throat is sore."
Holly: "Why is your throat sore?"
Me: "Because there was a tube in my throat to help me breathe."
Holly: "Why?"
Me: "So I could breathe while the doctor operated on me."
Holly: "Well how did they get the tube out of your throat?"
Me: "They took it out."
Holly: "How?"
Me: "They pulled it out."
Holly: "How?"
Me: "With their hands."
Holly: "Ewww!"
I don't know what picture was running through her mind about the tube in my throat, but she was all concerned about it.
At home, I pretty much went to bed. I was in and out of sleep the rest of the night. The kids played outside and checked in on me. One by one I got homemade Get Well Soon cards. Bridget's was the most funny. She drew me at the hospital in a skirt and purple dangling earrings with my crutches. She was also at the hospital dressed as a princess. Holly and Megan drew nice pictures too. Nothing from Liam but some hugs and kisses which is perfectly fine with me. They all enjoyed watching me crutch through the house and were helpful with moving their toys out of the way for me.
Overall, the pain wasn't too bad. I could feel the numbing reside. I could move around on my crutches pretty well, but getting up and down from a chair or bed was still tricky. Shawn is a great nurse. He's been refilling my ICEMAN as the ice melts. He has a timer set on his phone for when I need to take my Vicodin. He's gotten me bottles of water, many refills, plugged in my electronics, and overall been a great husband...in sickness and in health!
Wednesday, June 5, 2013
Hip surgery: Background info
I know it's been forever since blogging but a friend of mine (Hi Kristen!) said I should blog about my hip surgery since she'll be going through the same thing soon. So here I am.
So here's the background info. When I was pregnant with Bridget 8 years ago, I started noticing that my knee would sometimes buckle when going upstairs. Scary! I didn't think much of it, I was pregnant, awkward, and thought it just was a part of pregnancy. Plus, after that split second of knee-buckling, everything went back to normal. That happened a few times while pregnant. After Bridget was born, all was well. A few times over the next few years I'd have that knee-buckling experience coupled with some mild hip pain but really nothing that alarmed me. Once pregnant with the triplets, things got WAY worse. I found myself limping at times, knee giving out on stairs and mild hip pain. Two summers ago I also took on the couch to 5K program, lost 25-30 lbs, but destroyed my hip. That's when I started seeing doctors.
The first doctor I was referred to was a back specialist. He was a moron and was basically asking me what I thought the diagnosis was! Seriously, he showed me my MRI and asked me what I thought of it. I high-tailed it out of his office and was referred to a orthopedic surgeon. This gal was very aggressive and was ready to schedule me for surgery right away. She thought there was a labral tear and was talking possible hip replacement. Well at the time, I wasn't ready to go the surgery route, so she referred me to a pain management doctor. I went through several injections of cortisone in order to pinpoint the exact location of the pain. Oddly enough, the location that gave me the most relief was an injection near the top-center of my thigh. So I spent about a year with that doc, never really getting complete relief from my pain.
I hit my low point when Shawn and I went to Seattle for a wedding. We did a lot of walking, and the one night we were walking to our hotel and every step felt like a knife was being jabbed into my hip. It was horrible and the Naproxen gave me no relief. A couple days after returning from Seattle I got another injection and that helped. Then I got sick, and saw my regular doctor who asked if my hip was fixed yet, and when I told her my story, she referred me to a fourth doctor. He was supposed to be the best hip guy in our area. So I think it was in November when I started seeing Dr. Dworsky. New MRI and X-rays were ordered. He said I have bad bone structure. The ball of my hip sits about 90% into the socket when the average person is at about 50%. He sent me to consult with the back specialist just to be sure that my back wasn't playing into this at all. The back doctor said my back is good, even though I have a couple of compressed discs (he said almost everyone has compressed discs by 40), they weren't touching any nerves and that my back was in good shape. Yeah! So, back to Dr. Dworsky...we did two cortisone injections that helped quite a bit. He said the pain management doctor was injecting me with too little cortisone. He said the amount of cortisone I was given would be enough to stitch up a finger, not enough to reduce inflammation in a joint. Great! So Dworsky's injections took me to early May.
Then we decided to fix what's broke instead of trying to mask the pain. With the school year coming to an end, getting it done as soon as school was out would allow me to recover over the summer break. We also planned to have the kids in summer camp at the Joliet Park District for the entire month of June, so that we wouldn't have to worry about them being underfoot while I got back on my feet. Anyway, Dworsky's plan was to do a scope on my hip, shave off any bone spurs that might be there to allow more movement of the joint. He wasn't going to take me from 90% impacted to 50%, but he'd give my bones more room to move properly. He suspected that the labrum was being pinched between the bones as well, causing pain and inflammation. If the labrum was torn, he'd repair it. If the labrum was separated from the bone, he'd reattach it. Those were the things he'd have to see about once he got inside my leg. He also said that the separation would be the worst case scenario. If he had to reattach the labrum, I would have to be non-weight-bearing and no twisting for the first several days. He said recovery would be slower at first but the overall timeline of 6 weeks of Physical Therapy would stay the same. With any of the listed procedures, I should expect to pretty much do nothing the first few days, start 6 weeks of physical therapy within 5-7 days post-op, crutches for about 2 weeks, and stitches out at 2 weeks.
I had to go a week prior to surgery without any pain medication. (I was taking 500 mg of Naproxen twice a day) That was tough, and each day got a little more painful. Saturday was the worst! But then Sunday and Monday were really good days, which was weird since Sunday we had the kids' birthday party and I wasn't exactly resting. Monday was busy too. I finished up all the laundry in the house and got things in order for my recovery. So I don't know why I wasn't in more pain, but hey, I'll take it. Monday was the kids' first day of camp. They go from 9 am to 4 pm. This was Bridget's 4th year of camp, and the triplet's first year of camp. They all said they had a lot of fun! Liam even thanked me for sending him to camp this summer. It was sweet! But boy were they TIRED when they got home. Allison spent the night since Uncle Marc was coming over to watch the kids while Shawn got me to the hospital Tuesday morning.
So here's the background info. When I was pregnant with Bridget 8 years ago, I started noticing that my knee would sometimes buckle when going upstairs. Scary! I didn't think much of it, I was pregnant, awkward, and thought it just was a part of pregnancy. Plus, after that split second of knee-buckling, everything went back to normal. That happened a few times while pregnant. After Bridget was born, all was well. A few times over the next few years I'd have that knee-buckling experience coupled with some mild hip pain but really nothing that alarmed me. Once pregnant with the triplets, things got WAY worse. I found myself limping at times, knee giving out on stairs and mild hip pain. Two summers ago I also took on the couch to 5K program, lost 25-30 lbs, but destroyed my hip. That's when I started seeing doctors.
The first doctor I was referred to was a back specialist. He was a moron and was basically asking me what I thought the diagnosis was! Seriously, he showed me my MRI and asked me what I thought of it. I high-tailed it out of his office and was referred to a orthopedic surgeon. This gal was very aggressive and was ready to schedule me for surgery right away. She thought there was a labral tear and was talking possible hip replacement. Well at the time, I wasn't ready to go the surgery route, so she referred me to a pain management doctor. I went through several injections of cortisone in order to pinpoint the exact location of the pain. Oddly enough, the location that gave me the most relief was an injection near the top-center of my thigh. So I spent about a year with that doc, never really getting complete relief from my pain.
I hit my low point when Shawn and I went to Seattle for a wedding. We did a lot of walking, and the one night we were walking to our hotel and every step felt like a knife was being jabbed into my hip. It was horrible and the Naproxen gave me no relief. A couple days after returning from Seattle I got another injection and that helped. Then I got sick, and saw my regular doctor who asked if my hip was fixed yet, and when I told her my story, she referred me to a fourth doctor. He was supposed to be the best hip guy in our area. So I think it was in November when I started seeing Dr. Dworsky. New MRI and X-rays were ordered. He said I have bad bone structure. The ball of my hip sits about 90% into the socket when the average person is at about 50%. He sent me to consult with the back specialist just to be sure that my back wasn't playing into this at all. The back doctor said my back is good, even though I have a couple of compressed discs (he said almost everyone has compressed discs by 40), they weren't touching any nerves and that my back was in good shape. Yeah! So, back to Dr. Dworsky...we did two cortisone injections that helped quite a bit. He said the pain management doctor was injecting me with too little cortisone. He said the amount of cortisone I was given would be enough to stitch up a finger, not enough to reduce inflammation in a joint. Great! So Dworsky's injections took me to early May.
Then we decided to fix what's broke instead of trying to mask the pain. With the school year coming to an end, getting it done as soon as school was out would allow me to recover over the summer break. We also planned to have the kids in summer camp at the Joliet Park District for the entire month of June, so that we wouldn't have to worry about them being underfoot while I got back on my feet. Anyway, Dworsky's plan was to do a scope on my hip, shave off any bone spurs that might be there to allow more movement of the joint. He wasn't going to take me from 90% impacted to 50%, but he'd give my bones more room to move properly. He suspected that the labrum was being pinched between the bones as well, causing pain and inflammation. If the labrum was torn, he'd repair it. If the labrum was separated from the bone, he'd reattach it. Those were the things he'd have to see about once he got inside my leg. He also said that the separation would be the worst case scenario. If he had to reattach the labrum, I would have to be non-weight-bearing and no twisting for the first several days. He said recovery would be slower at first but the overall timeline of 6 weeks of Physical Therapy would stay the same. With any of the listed procedures, I should expect to pretty much do nothing the first few days, start 6 weeks of physical therapy within 5-7 days post-op, crutches for about 2 weeks, and stitches out at 2 weeks.
I had to go a week prior to surgery without any pain medication. (I was taking 500 mg of Naproxen twice a day) That was tough, and each day got a little more painful. Saturday was the worst! But then Sunday and Monday were really good days, which was weird since Sunday we had the kids' birthday party and I wasn't exactly resting. Monday was busy too. I finished up all the laundry in the house and got things in order for my recovery. So I don't know why I wasn't in more pain, but hey, I'll take it. Monday was the kids' first day of camp. They go from 9 am to 4 pm. This was Bridget's 4th year of camp, and the triplet's first year of camp. They all said they had a lot of fun! Liam even thanked me for sending him to camp this summer. It was sweet! But boy were they TIRED when they got home. Allison spent the night since Uncle Marc was coming over to watch the kids while Shawn got me to the hospital Tuesday morning.
Tuesday, December 6, 2011
Saturday, September 3, 2011
Bridget is in Kindergarten!
Bridget is in Kindergarten! Through the summer she was a bit nervous about going to Kindergarten, which is unusual for her. She was never nervous about going to daycare, or her two different preschools. Perhaps it was because she'd be taking the school bus? In any case, she's there now, and of course, she loves it.
In the morning, neighbor Jeannie and the triplets walk down to the corner and see Bridget off to school. Upon their arrival to the school, the students go to the classroom where the teacher has a few coloring pages/crafts for the children to work on individually while waiting for everyone else to arrive. Every day I get the report as to how many of the crafts Bridget misses out on because her bus arrives so close to the start of the school day. She's very disappointed when she misses out on crafts. (Don't get me wrong, by crafts, I mean coloring pages or perhaps a coloring page that you cut out and order scenes sequentially. Really, they're no big deal.)
Early on, I had told Bridget's teacher that Bridget is already reading very well, and asked if she could please work on advancing her reading skills because Bridget so loves to read. A few days later the teacher told me that Bridget is a "Level 28 reader, which is unusually high for a kindergartener." I still need clarification as to what reading scale that is based on, but I suspect it's the DRA scale, which means she's reading at a 2nd or 3rd grade level. I'm really proud of her! There is another girl in the other kindergarten class who is also a high level reader, and the two of them are going to be pulled out of class during "reading time" so that they can read more appropriate material.
So now, my task is to work on her reading comprehension. She likes beginning chapter books, but sometimes she doesn't always follow along with what is going on in the story. On my last trip to the library, I picked up a few kids' mystery books. I'm thinking that a mystery would be an easy way to improve on her comprehension skills and also help with problem solving skills too.
Shawn and I are still trying to reign in her sassiness. She is still throwing too many tantrums for being a 5 year old! The minute something doesn't go her way, she's jumping up and down, stamping her feet, crying, whining and screaming. Sometimes throwing toys, pinching the babies, or kicking too---so this has got to stop. I've got her on a reward chart. If she has a tantrum free day, she gets a sticker. She gets rewards by collecting 1-3-5-and 7 stickers. 1 sticker gets her an extra bedtime story, 3 = a half hour computer time, 5 = a movie, and 7 is special time with mom or dad. We started this in the beginning of August, and it took her almost the whole month to earn her first 7 stickers. She decided to go to the Pottery Lounge with me. She painted a ceramic cat (kinda looks like a Littlest Pet Shop cat.) She had a great time and was very polite and thankful while we were painting, but the minute we got home, she kicked off again. She wanted a snack but we were about to eat dinner, so when I said, "no snack" she threw a big fit. Needless to say, she did NOT earn the sticker for that day!
One last Bridget story: we were all driving in the van last weekend and Liam was being a little joker. He and Bridget were in the very back of the van and the two of them were giggling and having a great time. Shawn and I weren't really listening to what they were saying, and the next thing we knew, Bridget's saying, "Liam! You're a little joker boy! You're cracking me nuts!" and Liam replied, "Yah! I cracking you nuts!" Shawn and I were busting up! It was so funny! The next thing Liam says is, "Bridgie! You got boobies! Boobies! Boobies! Boobies!" Where do they get this stuff?!?!?! (In case you're wondering, Bridget was combining the phrases "You're driving me nuts" and "You're cracking me up")
Ahhh kids...they're cracking me nuts!
In the morning, neighbor Jeannie and the triplets walk down to the corner and see Bridget off to school. Upon their arrival to the school, the students go to the classroom where the teacher has a few coloring pages/crafts for the children to work on individually while waiting for everyone else to arrive. Every day I get the report as to how many of the crafts Bridget misses out on because her bus arrives so close to the start of the school day. She's very disappointed when she misses out on crafts. (Don't get me wrong, by crafts, I mean coloring pages or perhaps a coloring page that you cut out and order scenes sequentially. Really, they're no big deal.)
Early on, I had told Bridget's teacher that Bridget is already reading very well, and asked if she could please work on advancing her reading skills because Bridget so loves to read. A few days later the teacher told me that Bridget is a "Level 28 reader, which is unusually high for a kindergartener." I still need clarification as to what reading scale that is based on, but I suspect it's the DRA scale, which means she's reading at a 2nd or 3rd grade level. I'm really proud of her! There is another girl in the other kindergarten class who is also a high level reader, and the two of them are going to be pulled out of class during "reading time" so that they can read more appropriate material.
So now, my task is to work on her reading comprehension. She likes beginning chapter books, but sometimes she doesn't always follow along with what is going on in the story. On my last trip to the library, I picked up a few kids' mystery books. I'm thinking that a mystery would be an easy way to improve on her comprehension skills and also help with problem solving skills too.
Shawn and I are still trying to reign in her sassiness. She is still throwing too many tantrums for being a 5 year old! The minute something doesn't go her way, she's jumping up and down, stamping her feet, crying, whining and screaming. Sometimes throwing toys, pinching the babies, or kicking too---so this has got to stop. I've got her on a reward chart. If she has a tantrum free day, she gets a sticker. She gets rewards by collecting 1-3-5-and 7 stickers. 1 sticker gets her an extra bedtime story, 3 = a half hour computer time, 5 = a movie, and 7 is special time with mom or dad. We started this in the beginning of August, and it took her almost the whole month to earn her first 7 stickers. She decided to go to the Pottery Lounge with me. She painted a ceramic cat (kinda looks like a Littlest Pet Shop cat.) She had a great time and was very polite and thankful while we were painting, but the minute we got home, she kicked off again. She wanted a snack but we were about to eat dinner, so when I said, "no snack" she threw a big fit. Needless to say, she did NOT earn the sticker for that day!
One last Bridget story: we were all driving in the van last weekend and Liam was being a little joker. He and Bridget were in the very back of the van and the two of them were giggling and having a great time. Shawn and I weren't really listening to what they were saying, and the next thing we knew, Bridget's saying, "Liam! You're a little joker boy! You're cracking me nuts!" and Liam replied, "Yah! I cracking you nuts!" Shawn and I were busting up! It was so funny! The next thing Liam says is, "Bridgie! You got boobies! Boobies! Boobies! Boobies!" Where do they get this stuff?!?!?! (In case you're wondering, Bridget was combining the phrases "You're driving me nuts" and "You're cracking me up")
Ahhh kids...they're cracking me nuts!
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