Appendectomy

Yesterday I said "bye, bye" to my inflamed appendix.  I showed up to work just to have terrible stomach pain and vomiting (I work at 7 am) it got worse and worse until finally my replacement nurse arrived around noon and I was whisked down to the first floor where my sister, Heidi, was waiting to take me to the emergency room.  Luckily I took a little blue bag because on the way there I was sick as a dog... I think I even scared my sister a little bit with my crying and throwing up. (I can be a bit dramatic but I really was pretty sick).  We got the ER and I ran in praying I would get an IV placed as soon as possible to get some heavy duty pain medication.  Once I got my IV they gave me some Zofran (pretty much anti-vomit medication) and some Morphine.  Sadly, the morphine just didn't do anything for my pain.  I requested some Toradol (IV Motrin) and after about a half hour, it did the trick.  THEN they made me drink an entire liter of contrast so that they could see my intestinal tract on a Cat Scan.  If you've ever had to drink this stuff, you know that it is flavored like Crystallite lemonade and that although that doesn't sound too bad... it is!  You have to drink 1 cup of it every 15 minutes on top of having a very sore stomach that you just spent all morning getting rid of all its contents.  Anyways, the CT scan was finally done and boy does the IV contrast they give you make you feel like you are going to pee your pants!  It's the weirdest feeling ever!

I was 100% expecting that the doctor would come in after the CT scan and tell me that there was nothing wrong with me because this was not my first ER visit for this same exact kind of pain... but no... he announced that I had appendicitis and showed me a nice little picture of my, what did not look so inflamed to me, appendix and told me I would likely be in surgery that night.  Well, that was a big understatement because within an hour, I was under the knife.  I had no time to get scared or think about what was happening.  Neither did Johnny... until he was anxiously waiting in the room for me to be done.  He always puts on a very strong face for me but then every time I've had surgery, he freaks out in the waiting room so scared that I'm not going to make it out alive.  Yes, he is very sweet, but he'll deny it if you ask him.

I had to stay overnight in the hospital, which is very strange being on the patient end of nursing care.  I really don't like it very much and have greater sympathy for what my patient's go through every day.  I had so many great visitors though, my sister Heidi, my Dad and Kim, and Johnny's parents Teresa and Ralph and John, Bonnie and Becki all came to visit with nice flowers, cards, mini cadbury eggs (my favorite) and yummy drinks.  It was so good to see everyone and take time to appreciate the fact that we have such amazing medical advances to keep me healthy and such a caring and supportive family that love Johnny and I.