Sleep?? Who Needs That????

Yawn



I barely slept last night. I think I got roughly 3 hours from the way I was feeling when I woke up to Jeff's alarm clock going off at 5 something this morning. I laid in bed with my eyes closed listening to my music aimed at giving me sleep. I'm not sure how long I was in bed but at 6:20 I was crying....God I really need to get a couple more hours of good solid continuous sleep.

So much for my pleas and prayers to the Almighty. I decide to get ready for the day with my shower since the world wasn't awake in the home. I'm thinking I'm grateful for having my dad coming by at 9...I just need to make it until then and I'll take a nap.

At 9 my dad arrives and I give him a list of instructions...Seong Tae is sleeping in my bed due to a tummy ache, girls have had breakfast, dogs need to go out at 10, etc. Shortly after, I head upstairs for a 2 hour much needed nap after a sleepless night of discomfort and hot flashes.

I'm on Vivelle Dot .1 mg. I haven't had a hot flash until last night. Most of the night was one big huge hot flash. I'm not happy. I fought so long to keep my organs so that I could go into menopause naturally not surgically. I don't wish endometriosis on anybody. My maternal grandmother probably had it, my mom has it and I have it as well. I'm glad to break this cycle of pain, anguish, frustrations, and more. I'm glad that I found a caring surgeon who truly cares about the women that he sees. I'm glad that his office staff is so caring as well.

Right now I'm hoping that I can sleep through the night tonight. I need to have some good quality sleep to get me through the night so that my body can heal.

My recent surgery in Atlanta

I have been dealing with leg pain for awhile now along with low back pain from my endometriosis. I have done chiropractic care, physical therapy, and yoga with little result. My dad helped me out by taking me to my PT appointments and then watching the children twice a week for 3 months. I think that I have lost friends due to the pain because I couldn't drive to see them and was focused on trying to get me better. I had been in tears due to the constant pain I was in some days.

I gathered up my records and sent them to Atlanta to Dr. Albee at the CEC again after having my 7 hour surgery done by him in 2008. He is an angel. He did my 4th surgery on August 3rd lasting a few hours. He excised the endo on my diaphragm, took out the remaining portion of my right ovary due to the hemorrhagic cyst on it, and lysed the few adhesions that I had. Dr. Albee said that I was at Stage 2 (see http://www.health.am/images/uploads-gyneco/21-3.php for some details on the staging of endo).

I am quite sore. It hurts to take a deep breath in at times. My right side hurts to the touch. I haven't been able to sleep through the night yet due to my pain. I have incisional pain at my belly button and it isn't due to an infection.

Due to the surgical menopause that I find myself now in, I'm on estrogen patches. I cry over the loss of my organs. I cry due to the pain I'm in. I cry that I had to fight with my obgyn's office in order for me to be seen post op--they didn't want to see me as the surgeon does the post op visit and they didn't do the surgery but once I brought up Dr. Albee's name, the name of his group practice, and my willingness to give the nurse his phone #, I got my appointment for August 26th. I cry because of the possible loss of friends again this damn disease might have caused.

I am so so so thankful that I have a supportive husband who used up most of his vacation this year on me, family members who care, and friends who have stuck by me.

Gotta go back to resting. Jeff heads back to work tomorrow morning and I'm certainly not ready for that just yet.

The Weather and My Mood

Outside my home is cold, windy, raining, and dreary. Inside the home, while it's filled with laughter from my children, my mood is similar to the weather outside. I'm tired due to lack of quality sleep. I'm experiencing some dull abdominal throbbing at times but I think I know what that is do to. I'm feeling blue...and trying to shake the feeling. Somehow I think that if I can get the sleep and the pain under control, the blue feeling will go away.

Jeff helped me last night by cutting up some veggies for me to make soup this afternoon as a part of tonight's dinner. I didn't have the energy to do it yesterday afternoon myself.

I'm hoping to get over to the craft store soon so that I can pick out some grossgrain ribbon and some paint for a project that I'm trying to work on for my girls. It's a project that I wanted to do before my surgery. Hopefully I can go there tomorrow evening since today is just bad...

Not Coping Well Today...

Today is a bad day for me. I seem to be done with the ashy looking discharge but I have a reddish-pink discharge now. This isn't helping my emotions at all. I just want to scream, punch a door, and cry like I did when I was trying to conceive. I want to put up the walls and hide away right now.

Post Operative Appointment and the Report

Jeff and I went back to CEC this morning to have the cath removed and to have a post op appointment with Dr. Sinervo. Dr. Sinervo went over the pictures with us and he asked if I had any questions/concerns. I did tell him that I had several questions. He took his time and answered each and every one of them. He checked out my incisions (which is something I haven't really done yet due to pain and Jeff's descriptions of them).

I have a 9 page operative report to read through and a huge pathology report to read through. I read through part of the operative report but couldn't finish it...I found myself getting too emotional about it. But I can tell you this...

I was diagnosis with Stage 4 endometriosis. Out of a possible 150 points, I had 109. This isn't something that you want to get a high score on. My uterus had 3 diagnoses...endometriosis, adenomyosis, and leiomyomata (fibroids). My cul-de-sac was totally obliterated. My left ovary was covered with adhesions, multiple cysts, and sites of old cysts. My right ovary had an ovarian cystectomy (removal of the ovarian cyst). There's more to the report but I haven't read it all yet.

I will say this though...after my first 2 surgeries, I was laid up for a few weeks. I needed help getting on and off the toilet. I needed help to get on and off the couch. I needed to be followed as I walked from one room into another.

Here I am 4 days post op of a major 7 hour surgery and I can walk around our hotel room, walk around the grounds of our hotel not once, not twice but three times this evening. My first line of pain defense is 3 advil (that's 600 mg folks) every 6 hours. If that doesn't work then I'm on a prescription pain med. This is so much different than after my first two surgeries. I'm happy that I researched my choices for endometriosis excision experts and so far I'm extremely happy with Dr. Albee and the rest of the crew at the CEC. They are wonderfully supportive there.

Sleep

Today was a day for sleep. I'm so tired out. Jeff had to wake me for dinner. I had slept nearly 4 hours this afternoon and 1 1/2 hours this morning. Having surgery is tiring...