Friday, March 17, 2017, 5:30 am. I arrive yet again at good old St. Thomas Hospital where I am once again greeted by the most amazing staff known to man kind. I walk back to pre-op change into my hospital clothes and they provided me with these mesh like panties because of course with my luck I would be dealing with shark week the day of my surgery. (Insert real dramatic ass eye roll). Anyways, I change into my surgery attire and what happens next?? You guessed it....let's draw some blood and check these blood counts. Dr. Barnett came into the waiting room area where I was with that same disgruntle look as before which let me know that I was yet again being slapped in the face. Before, he could even deliver the news to me I grabbed his hand and begged him to not cancel my hysterectomy. I was exhausted. Mentally...physically...and spiritually and I knew that there was no way I would be able to endure another round of transfusions. I knew that my fight was over and if I am honest I wasn't willing to fight for anything more. Life...my health...my healing...anything. I was tired and done! I was willing to deal with the consequences of my actions of rejecting the treatment. I knew with blood counts at a 7 that I was going to need a blood transfusion either during or after this surgery. I knew that if this surgery went south that my life would be in more jeopardy than it has ever been. I let Dr. Barnett know that if anything went wrong during this procedure to let nature just run it's course and to hug my mother tight and let her know that all is well with me and with any outcome that presented itself. So I mentally prepared myself for the worst and I'm really glad that I did. It made for a much smoother let down this time around.
He grabbed my hands and spoke these silent words in my ear.....Moeneak, do you mind if we say a prayer with you this morning??? I immediately felt myself surrender to God and his plan for my life. It was like all of my doubts and fears dropped immediately. He prayed and I cried. The nurses prayed and I cried some more. The anesthesiologist prayed and I cried even harder. I was surrounded by some of the most amazing angles that one could ask for. When my eyes opened I was surrounded by about 10-12 people whose eyes were red and wet from the tears that they shed with me. They hugged me tight and wished me well on my new journey. We cleared our eyes because it was show time. Dr. Barnett let me know that the surgery would last about 2 hours...2.5 hours max and I was comforted by that.
7:30 am I watched the blurry walls and lights as they rolled me out of the room to the operating room. I heard Dr. Barnett tell me that I should count to 10 and I only remember getting to about 3 before I was knocked out from them good...good..drugs. Lol.
When I woke up from my surgery it was around 3:30 pm or 4:00 pm. The day of surgery in itself is still very very blurry and unclear to me. I don't remember much. Mainly because somewhere throughout the process I believe I placed some walls up to protect me from the trauma that I knew was ahead of me. But what I do know is that this surgery took a long ass time. Like 6.5 to 7 hours worth of time. How we went from 2-2.5 hours max and end up at 6.5-7 hours is ridiculous to me BUT when I told y'all that things were bad....I meant that things were bad. I have a 4 minute clip of my surgery and it gets gross y'all. So only watch it if you have a tough stomach cause it'll have you cringing.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/mj0juxv146ddtod/difficult%20hysterectomy.mp4?dl=0 (Once you click on the link a second link will pop up that will take you to the video. If you watch this video it starts off with how my endometriosis looked and what it was doing to my insides and at the end of the video it shows how they burned, cleared and removed everything. Again, watch at your own risk).
My ovaries and uterus were covered in endometriosis and ruptured tumors the size of melons. The endometriosis spread to every organ in my body including my heart, lungs, liver, rectum etc. The shit was everywhere...which explains why my body was fighting so hard to keep me a live. I shed a lot of blood. And I mean a lot of blood. The transfusion was on stand by because we were all super sure that I would need one before the end of this surgery BUT to everyone's surprise...I never ended up getting one. In my paperwork of my surgery Dr. Barnett describes my endometriosis as being one of the worst cases of this disease that he has ever seen. Which led to them showing the 6.5 hour long video of surgery in the training classes around the world. (Which I am still sooo shook) about and honored all at the same time.
I received 4 very small incisions in my stomach....again pictures will come. 1 of the incisions is about the size of a thumb and the other 3 are about the size of a finger nail. This procedure hurt like hell!! It hurt to cough..to sit up..to lay down.. to pee.. to poop..to eat.. to blow my nose..to live basically. It hurt to freaking live. I stayed at the hospital overnight because they wanted to make sure that I wouldn't lose any more blood and to keep a close watch on me and once I was able to walk...I was released.
The recovery period was hard and long. The full recovery is 1 year but I was given 6 weeks off to rest and heal my body. If I'm being honest 6 weeks was not enough. I couldn't even sit up let alone function in daily life. I'm a pretty independent woman on my own. I do for myself and handle my own business. I don't require much from anyone because I believe that no one has my best interest for myself better than Moeneak. So when my mother had to wipe me, and bathe me my spirits were shot. This surgery was done and I was yet and still broken. The vulnerability and openness that I had to walk in was tough. I knew that I was not well enough to do anything for myself but still the thought of me relying on my village to perform basic tasks was not as easy as one would think.
I was placed on hormone patches that were put in place to help me with the backlash of hot flashes and to help me regulate my hormones from being sent right into menopause. The only problem with this solution is that I found out that I was highly allergic to the adhesive in the patches; as well as, the adhesive that was covering my incisions. Welp, you guessed it. That was a complete disaster because ALL 4 of my incisions wound up infected. So, on top of the pain from the surgery and trying to regain strength and motivation after this very, very traumatic surgery I am now having to deal with an issue of infected incisions. Yep, you guessed it again.....I'm now back to being defeated. It was so baffling to me how bad thing after bad thing after bad thing was happening to me. I can't tell you how many times I asked God why he wouldn't just let me have 1 day of sunshine?? Why I couldn't have a break from all of the bricks that he kept putting on me?? I mean the anger set in like Angela Bassett when she burned my dudes car up into flames on A Thin Line Between Love and Hate.
About 2.5 or 3 weeks into my recovery I was OVER it. Completely over it, so I started being very independent. I was showering myself, cooking for myself, lifting well over my 5 lb limit, cleaning, doing laundry, driving etc. I was doing EVERYTHING that I know I shouldn't have been doing, but for my own sanity...I needed to do it. It was the only thing that was bringing me out of my funk from these messed up situations. And I thought things were really looking up for me...
I went for my 2 week post surgery check up and I knew that something awful had happened. I was experiencing the most excruciating pain that I had ever encountered. And the pain from endometriosis is tough all on its own...women that I have spoken to described it as being in constant child labor pain with no drugs to help you get through that shit...well, this pain was 10 times worse. I couldn't walk. I couldn't stand up. It hurt to freaking move. Dr. Barnett performed a vaginal test to look and make sure that my stitches were healing in my vagina (which...lets just pause right there. I wasn't even aware that I was cut in my vagina so this entire check up was a complete shock to me). And of course....they weren't. My stitches that were holding my vagina cuff ( which is just the term that is used for after the removal of the uterine specimen, the vaginal incision is sutured closed) together was torn. Honey, at this point of my life I didn't give 2 cares about what he was saying. I WAS OVER THIS ENTIRE JOURNEY. Dr. Barnett let me know that I needed to remain on a very strict regimen in order for the vaginal cuff to heal because I was at a high risk for another surgery because with a torn vaginal cuff there is a possibility that your organs can fall out. I rolled my eyes, told him thank you and walked out.
Sharon, my awesome nurse met me at the door and hugged me because you could feel the amount of fucks that I didn't care about. She handed me my next appointment slip which was 2 weeks later. And 2 weeks later I arrived..the same process..procedure..and the same results. For 10 weeks, I went to biweekly check ups to check on the progression of my vaginal cuff and FINALLY on the 16th week I was 98% healed.....that news was just what I needed......
Speak your truths...let them fall from your mouth or forever hold them and know no peace. -K. Raymer
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