So, today, my mom had the surgery the we’ve been working so hard for the past…oh, 7 or 8 months or so to get her to have. It’s done. It’s half of the huge load off. The other half will obviously be seeing, once she’s recovered, that it’s worked as well as we needed it to.
So, the day started off very early, up with the parents at 5:00am, eating a quick small amount of food (though not for mom, obviously) and then piling into the car to head to the hospital. She was nervous, but actually much less than I’d thought she might be. More anxious to just get in there and have the procedure done with. Took some photos in the hospital on the way in, sat in the check in section for about an hour before the called her into the pre-op area. That place is pretty intense, let me tell you. And, by intense, I mean bustling with activity. Stanford Medical Center is a pretty big hospital, obviously, they do a lot of procedures there, so it was something like 20 people in the pre-op area, with all the appropriate attendees, surgeons, pharmacists, etc. all tending to people and getting them ready. From there, we said we loved her, and left her for the doctors to take care of.
Dad and I then went to get some food, and then having really nothing to do until she was done with surgery, went back to the hospital and found the waiting room for the ICU section that she was going to be staying in after her surgery. I was able to take about 30 minute nap in there, but that was about it. Did my writing hour while we were there, Dad read, talked to the Ho a couple times via FaceTime. Watched a little bit of Spring Training A’s baseball.
The procedure was suppose to be finished by around 12:30/1pm, and sure enough, pretty much right on time at 1:00 they posted over on the surgery status board that she was being all closed up and finishing. Then the surgeon, Dr. Riley, came out to let us know that she was fine, the surgery had been successful, and he was very happy with the result. And, that we’d be able to go visit her in the next 20 minutes or so, once they had her situated in her bed and all covered up.
Going back to see her was definitely emotional. I mean, you know what the doctors have told you, and so you know that she’s in good shape, super drugged up and in no pain, and everything looks exactly the way that it should post-op, but seeing you mother’s face swollen, bruised, and blood coming from the corners of her mouth and nose just isn’t normal. It’s not the way people are supposed to look. So, that was a little intense, got choked up for a few minutes, as did my dad. But, it’s all tempered with the fact that it’s just a knee-jerk reaction. She’s actually in good shape, and everybody’s happy. And, it definitely was *not* emotional for my mom. She was prreeetttyyy doped up and sleepy. But, she totally recognized us, and I knew that she was happy to see us because she conked out within minutes of us being there. Relaxed enough at that point to just fall asleep, which is exactly what we wanted her to do. No reason to stay awake after your jawbone has been intentionally broken and repositioned, right?
I came back with my Dad, to the trailer, and he needed to run errands. I had delusions of sleeping for an hour or so and then getting some work done. Ha. Delusions indeed. I slept like a freaking ROCK for three hours straight. I woke up once to go pee, and remember thinking, I should try and wake up. Nope. Didn’t happen. And, I’m still tired. Pretty sure that I’ll sleep pretty good tonight, too.
Then, once my Dad had finished running the errands he needed to for his job site tomorrow morning, we went back to the hospital, picking up some flowers along the way, promptly finding out once we’d arrived that they can’t have flowers in the ICU. Which was like, duh, of course not. Allergies in the ICU? Terrible idea. But we were able to *show* my mom the flowers. She’d been sleeping, which was great, and she was even a little more awake this time than earlier, and she was giving thumbs up. Not in too much pain. Undoubtedly extremely uncomfortable, but not in major pain, which means that the meds were doing their job. So, we left her to go back to sleep again, and here we are.
I’ll go and visit her tomorrow in the morning, and then when my Dad is off work, we’ll go again in the evening and check up on her. I’m pretty sure as long as she’s bleeding, she’ll be under pretty heavy meds, but apparently that’s only supposed to last for the next couple days. Then, she’ll be awake more of the time, and able to just kind of hang out. We have a notepad for her to write on. It’ll be fine. One-way conversations.
That’s the news that’s fit to report on this monumental day. Peace out bitches.