How it went...

I had my surgery on Monday to remove the kidney stones that were in my left kidney. My surgery was scheduled for 1:30 pm, so I had to be at the hospital at 11:30. I was checked in right away and taken upstairs to the pre-op area. I was transferred from my wheelchair to a gurney, and then I was undressed and put into a ultra-chic hospital down. After all of my vital signs and initial information was taken there was a lot of down time where I was just waiting. Fortunately, my mom brought along the book we are currently reading for our book group, so we were able to make quite a bit of progress in our book.

The anesthesiologist came in shortly after 2 pm and put some medicine in my IV, and after a few short minutes I was out of it. Although I was still conscious, this is the last thing I remembered and my mom said that I was "flying high." I was taken to surgery about 2:15 pm, although the surgery didn't really get underway until 2:45. My mom got a call from my urologist a little before 5:30 pm and he said that things had gone well, but he'd had a little bit more trouble getting the stones out then he'd anticipated. (There were several kidney stones -- one big one and lots of small ones.)

My doctor wanted me to stay in the hospital overnight just to make sure I was recovering well, since in the past I've developed major complications. I was taken to my hospital room about 6:50 pm, and although it wasn't a room in the ICU, it was a nice, large room. (The reason I always like to stay in the ICU is because that's where I get the best care. The nurses in the ICU only care for two patients, so they can devote a little more time to each of their patients. The nurses on regular floors care for five or six patients apiece, so a lot of times my needs get overlooked since they are so busy.)

My mom had decided beforehand that if I had to stay on a regular patient floor she would stay with me to make sure I was well cared for. When my nurse found out that my mom was going to be staying overnight with me, a hospital bed was brought in for her to sleep on. My sister Laura and her husband Brett came to visit in the evening, as well as my sister Chandra.

Although I was quite tired, I still had a hard time sleeping through the night. It was harder to get comfortable, and people kept coming in my room to do different things to me, so my mom and I kept getting woken up. However, we were both able to get quite a bit of sleep, all things considered. I was just so grateful to have my mom/advocate there with me in the hospital.

One of the urological residents that works with my urologist came to check on me the next morning at 6:15 and told me that everything looked good and that I could go home that day. I was dressed and ready to go home by 9:30. In my past hospital experiences the discharge process has taken all day, so I was pleasantly surprised to be on my way home by 10:30.

The drive home from Barnes Hospital takes about 40 minutes, plus my doctor prescribed an antibiotic, so we stopped by Walgreens to get it, and my mom had to wait about 30 minutes for it. I was quite tired (you usually are when recovering from anesthesia) so I slept the entire way home, including the wait at Walgreens! Actually, I slept most of the day yesterday. Anytime I would try to watch TV or have my mom read to me, I would fall asleep!

So long story short is that I survived another surgery! I didn't make my 2010 goal of not being hospitalized, but hopefully I will make it the rest of the year and a good portion of next year before anything goes amiss with me.