A Farewell to Knees

First off, thank you SO much to everyone for their prayers, well-wishes, & support! It made a big difference for me & I really appreciate it. An advance thank you to Vinya, Mayfawny, Sarah, & Jacob for helping me out next week to get around campus. I'm really fortunate to have such wonderful people in my life.

I didn't sleep well last night at all. I kept waking up because I was nervous I would sleep through my alarm & miss my surgery (I had to wake up at 7). I ended up waking up at 6 and just staying up. Which was rough because all I wanted were pancakes but that was not allowed.

I got there in time with Husband in tow. I was easily the youngest person in the surgery waiting room by 40 years. After about 30 minutes of waiting, a nurse came out to take me back to the pre-op area. I didn't have my contacts in (also not allowed) but when the nurse walked up to me, I realized that she was one of my really good friend's moms! She gave me a hug and my nerves were instantly calmed. I know that it wasn't just a coincidence that she was assigned to me. She helped me get settled and talked to me a lot which helped distract me from the IV and so forth (which I'm not a fan of). She's the best.

My amazing friends made this bedazzled hospital gown for me about 5 years ago for my hip surgery. It made me happy to break it out again. 

Close-up of this beautiful handiwork. 

Pretty soon, I was being wheeled into the operating room. They put on music and then suddenly, the music got really fast and sounded like a chorus of munchkins singing and I thought "Oh boy, here comes the loopy-ness I better just close my...." and I was out. Next thing I knew, I was in the first recovery room asking when I could see my husband. A few minutes later, a different nurse wheeled me over to the second recovery room. She took one look at me and said, "Oh wow, you are green, you're going to vomit here's a basin". Now before I go on, I need to explain something about myself. I have never thrown up. The only time I kind of did was when I was 8 years old and I spat up some gatorade. Ever since then, I have had an irrational fear of other people throwing up, me throwing up, etc. I sometimes get anxiety panic attacks when stuff like that comes up. I can't even see movies where someone throws up. So when the moderately helpful nurse said that to me, I panicked. I got super tense and my whole body started shaking. I tried to explain to her why I was reacting that way and she felt really bad but continued to insist that I was going to vomit. I was determined that I wouldn't so I quickly took the basin off of me and set it on the table where it was out of sight. Moderately helpful nurse lady then brought me in about 5 more blankets and essentially swaddled me up in them to keep me from shaking. She said anesthesia can make people really cold so that combined with my panic attack meant it looked like I was having a seizure.

I can't believe I'm showing you this picture. But here I am wrapped up in a gazillion blankets. I was still feeling kind of funky at this point. 

FINALLY, Husband came into the recovery room. He had a great time watching my heart rate go up on the monitors every time he touched me. I continued to feel dizzy, but I didn't vomit (thank goodness). I said lots of prayers as did Husband and I was just fine. I sipped my orange juice and then informed moderately helpful nurse lady that I was ready to go home. Getting dressed was tricky since my knee is wrapped in gauze, an ace bandage, etc. But they got me in the wheel chair and sent me on my merry way home.

The doctor said the surgery went really well. In case you didn't know, they went in and folded over a tendon that had gotten really stretched out, and was thus messing up the natural movement of my knee cap, and used a miniature sewing machine to tighten it up again. It should be a quick recovery.

The rest of the day has been quiet. I watched TV for about 40 minutes and then couldn't keep my eyes open any longer. I then fell asleep for about 2.5 hours. At one point during which I woke up and realized I had somehow managed to slobber all over the couch. So that was fun. I have eaten a little bit and plan on joining the crew for dinner. My knee hurts a lot, but I think I'll be fine. I have a fancy cooling machine that I'll use on my knee to help it during the recovery. It comes in a rolly suitcase. I'll be the coolest cat on campus toting that thing around.

I still have a bunch of these weird sticky things on my chest/back. You'd think they would have removed them before they discharged me. They kind of hurt to take off. 

It was kind of cool to see how the tables had turned in Husband & I's relationship. Just two summers ago, I was helping Husband with his knee surgery (done by the same doctor & everything) and drove him home and took care of him for the day. That was kind of what started it all and we went on our first official date just a few days after that. And then we fell in love. I'm hoping that we don't have another surgery story together though, I'm good with one for each of us :)

Excited To: Eat real food.
Number of Saltine Crackers Eaten: ~ 17
Number of Saltine Cracker Crumbs Down My Shirt: ~ 1,000,000
Days Until Christmas: 348