Tonsillectomy

It has now been over eight days since my tonsils were forcefully removed from my mouth by a cauterizing knife. I'm finally feeling well enough to write up a wonderful little description of day of the surgery.

Day 0 (Thursday):
I wake up this morning and immediately begin feeling anxious. I know that it's not a major surgery, but it is my first real one, and the idea of it is finally making me uncomfortable. Mike wakes up early with me and gets me to the hospital at 7:45am. Thanks, Mike.

I get checked in, fill in some more paperwork, get undressed and slip into one of those awesome hospital smocks. I am completely unable to tie those ridiculous loops in the back, so my ass is hanging out. Meh. I am just taken directly to bed anyway. I have a very nice nurse, and we chat for a bit. I am trying to sound very nonchalant about the whole surgery thing, but I'm sure she can tell that I'm totally bluffing. We talk about the science thing, and the world trip thing, and some other things.

Then begins the poking.

I really don't like needles. It's not the pain, though. You can pinch me all day long, and I've got no problems. It's that feeling of having something underneath my skin. Something that's either pushing fluid into or sucking blood out of my body. It's very unnerving, and has caused me to faint more than once. I tell the nurse this, and she smiles and says she'll be quick. She's not. She tries the vein near the top of my left wrist. Insert. Wriggle. Wriggle. Tap-tap. Hmm. Wriggle. Tap. Nope. Next up, right wrist. Guess what happens? Good guess. Both of arms are now bleeding, but no IV. She's slightly embarrassed, and says that we'll just wait for my doctor to swing by, since he loves doing IVs.

It turns out that he doesn't actually love doing IVs, and isn't that great at it, either. He goes for a vein on the top of my left hand. He spends two minutes in there fiddling the needle around, trying pierce that stupid vein. No luck. My hand is still bruised there.

Holes in me: 3. IVs in me: 0.

So, the anesthesiologist comes rolling around. Can he do it? Can he!? Yes! He uses the big, juicy vein on the inside of the left elbow. One quick prick, and I'm golden. IV in. Juices flowing. Finally, it's all over.

Oh, wait. I still have to do the surgery. Fuck.

Actually, the surgery is easy. They roll me into the operating room, put a mask over my face, and put me to sleep. Then, they cut my shit up.

I wake up to a nurse googooing over me.

"C'mon, now. Jason. C'mon, Jason. Wake up. Wake up. Heeeyyyyy. Hello. How are you feeling?"

I feel weird. Like that feeling you get right when you first wake up, but it won't go away. And there's something in the back of my throat that's making it hard to breath. I find out it's my extra-swollen uvula. I sit there for about two hours, slowly regaining consciousness, with a nurse stopping by every 15 minutes or so, making sure that I'm OK. They give me ice chips to suck on. That's when I first notice how difficult it is to swallow. But, it doesn't hurt too bad, so I'm not that worried.

Eventually, Mike comes back. He's here to pick me up, which means I can finally leave this hospital. It's a little tricky, but I slide out of bed, hobble to the changing room, and dress myself in real-person clothes. 15 minutes later, Mike and I are on the road, back home.
That's when the pain starts to pick up.

Luckily, I had gotten all of the prescriptions I needed yesterday, and Christina was getting them filled now. By the time I got home, she should have them ready for me. I ask Mike to call her just too be sure. This way, I can be drugged out of my mind for the rest of the afternoon, and leave the pain for another day. I get home at 1pm.

At 2pm, Christina's still not here, but Matt and Nilma show up to see how the surgery went. I'm sure I look like shit, and I'm in that not-so-nice space between post-surgery haze and rising pain. They sit around my bed for a bit and chat, and I try to be cordial. But, it's fairly apparent that I'm in pain, and it's hard for me to talk, so they leave after not too long. I ask Mike to call Christina. He says that she says that she'll be here shortly.

It's 3pm and Christina's still not here. I ask Mike to call her again, to find out were she is. It turns out she won't be here until 4pm. What? My whole head hurts right now.

It's 4pm and Christina's still not here. My head is pounding. My ears are killing me. My nose is swollen and bleeding. It's hard to breath. Even my teeth hurt. What. The. Fuck.

It's 5pm, and Christina finally shows up. She's comes bounding up the stairs and smiles into my room, where I'm hunched over my desk like death. I literally grab the pharmacy bag from her and growl something about taking so long. I'm sure she's sorry, but I can't tell, and I don't care. I'm in a shitload of pain, so I quickly read through the pharmacist's pamphlets and warnings. I think She tries to say something to me, but I ignore her and down my Hydrocodone. Christina heads back downstairs and rattles around the kitchen with Mike and Amy while I crawl into bed and hope the pain goes away soon.

She tells me later that she cried.

(... continue...)