TAH - My Castle Story - Hystersisters Hysterectomy Article

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TAH - My Castle Story

TAH - My Castle Story

From the Abdominal Hysterectomy Stories Articles List

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Options to Hysterectomy
Pre-Op Hysterectomy
Post-Op Hysterectomy
Hormone and Menopause
Intimacy after Hysterectomy
Pelvic Floor
Fitness after Hysterectomy
GYN Cancer
Grief and Loss
Endometriosis
Uterine Fibroids
Hysterectomy Stories
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I've had heavy periods all my life. They've been fairly regular but heavy. When I hit 30 (I'm 33 now) is when the pain really began. I began having severe cramping prior to and during where I hadn't had this much before. Then the heavy bleeding really kicked in. A tampon change every 1/2 hour really tends to have to rule your life for a week out of the month. This and the pain were still bearable until the middle of 2004. That's when intercourse suddenly became painful. Not penetration but orgasm would be extremely painful. That's when I finally decided to talk to my family dr. about it. He immediately referred me to an OB/GYN and she said she thought it was either endometriosis or adenomyosis and elected not to bother with laprascopy as it carries some risks as I am overweight. She knew I had 3 children and had no emotional attachment to my uterus so she said she would do hysterectomy and remove all that she deemed necessary. She totally informed me of EVERY POSSIBLE risk with the surgery in general, and with mine in particular because of the excess fluffiness on my tummy.

She stated that she would take some extra precautions to ensure the best possible outcome, such as inserting a drain in my abdomen, a bit of extra strength inner stitching, etc.
I researched hysterectomies a lot and a friend told me about hystersisters. I joined shortly before my surgery which was 12/22/04. This site helped answer some questions I had as well as got me to ask a few more questions of the dr. and for that I'm grateful. I went into the surgery with full knowledge.
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SURGERY
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I was pretty nervous at the hospital, as I'd never had surgery before. I said some prayers and had people praying for me from their homes. Despite my best efforts, as soon as they started to wheel me into the operating room I burst into tears. The nurses wiped my tears and assured me that it's very normal to be afraid and that I would be fine, etc. The anesthesia went fine and before I knew it I was awake and in EXTREME BLADDER PAIN. The pain was so great that I was yelling 'HELP ME! Somebody help me, I think my bladder is full and I can't go!' They were all standing around and looking at my catheter, assuring me that I was peeing but I could not be convinced. My bladder was spasming and that was some horrible pain. I was sure my bladder was going to rupture and I'd live a miserable life or die a horrible death . LOL Finally a male nurse who was so very caring and attentive began to really bug the dr. to let me have some sort of rectal suppostory that IMMEDIATELY stopped the pain. I'm telling you that man deserves a medal! He said "these always work so well, I don't know why doctors don't use them more often." I was probably only writhing around for 15 minutes but it felt like hours. After that took effect I was happy as a clam, drugged on a pump of Dilauded (sp?) that I could press the button every so many minutes. I was out of surgery by 11:00 a.m. and taken to my room where they treated me really well. I was in very little pain for several hours and had several visitors, all bearing gifts and flowers and such. My DH could only stay a short time because my kids are all home from school on Christmas break.
By about 9:00 that night anxiety set in. I'm normally not a super anxious person so I'm not sure if it was the Dilauded or just my emotional response to stress, but I was HIGHLY anxious. I knew that when I pressed that button, the pain would go away and I would fall asleep. But I was absolutely convinced that I would sleep too deeply and quit breathing! I laid there freaking out, doing my breathing/blower apparatus to try to stay awake. This went on for an hour and I finally called the nurse and told her of my prophecies. To appease me, she put a pulse oximeter thing on my finger and set that up by my bed. If I stopped or slowed my breathing and the oxygen level got down to 90% it would start beeping and wake me up. This was an immense relief! I finally got to sleep and occassionally it would get down to 90 and start beeping so they gave me oxygen to wear and then it stayed at 98-100 and I slept like a baby, between nurse visits.
I was very careful to use the breathing apparatus to keep my lungs ship-shape. The nurses said I could get pneumonia if I didn't, and the mere thought of coughing at that point was enough to convince me! Every time I would wake up I would do 5-10 of the breaths, drink some water and fall back asleep. By morning they were telling me I needed to get up and walk. I thought they were nuts. Hehe Then at about 9:30 a.m. another bladder spasm came on and this time it was worse. My doctor went on vacation and the on-call dr. took a while to get ahold of. They requested the suppository and it took forever to get that ordered and to me. I think this went on for about an hour and a half and I was really in pain. I was crying, saying The Lord's Prayer, doing anything I could to control the pain. The nurses were getting out of sorts because they didn't have anything they could really do to help me. It was pretty bad but when the suppository finally came, it immediately went away and hasn't been back. Amen to that! After that they decided that my body didn't like the catheter and wanted to try removing it. I was fine with that but that meant getting up and going to the bathroom. By this time it was about 24 hours post-op. A vertical incision was done and they removed an enlarged uterus (adenomyosis) but my ovaries were fine and they left them in. My first time standing up was scary. I was just sure my incision would split open and we'd have to scrape my guts up off the floor.

No such tragedy occured and I walked to the bathroom, tried to pee and was unable to. The next time I tried I had success and it was like a victory! lol I began a routine of getting up to the bathroom, coming back to do 5 or so breathing deals, drinking a cup of water and then walking the halls. At first I couldn't walk far and was quite weak and shaky. I improved very quickly and then the agenda was to get me to pass gas. My body did not want to do this and it annoyed me no end. By day 3 I was able to pass gas, have a bowel movement (thanks to daily stool softener) and even took a shower. I went in on Wednesday, was home Saturday afternoon - Christmas day! I wasn't sent home with any gauze or potions of any sort. Just some maxi-pads that they said to wear on my tummy to cover the incision. In the hospital, my incision showed no signs of infection. Two days later my incision showed some infection and my drain was still in but putting out quite a bit of fluid still. I was prescribed an antibiotic and more pain pills and today, day 8 I’m improving. I feel like the worst is over and a new life has begun!

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TAH - My Castle Story

Find A Doctor Near You

Brad Cohen, M.D. 2477 Route 516 Suite 103 Old Bridge NJ 08857 732-679-6900	Larry R. Glazerman, M.D. USF College of Medicine 12901 Bruce B. Downs Blvd. MDC 62 Tampa FL 33612 813-259-8500	Aarathi Cholkeri-Singh, M.D. 120 Osler Drive Ste. 100 Napeville IL 60540 630-428-2229
Susan Carter, M.D. North Colorado Medical Center/ MCR 1800 15th Street, Suite 220 Greeley CO 80631 970 353 1335	David Zisow, M.D. 2005 Rock Spring Rd Ste. 3 Forest Hill - Baltimore MD 21050 410-879-1139	Debra Richardson, M.D. Gynecological Oncology Clinic - SW Med 2201 Inwood Road Suite 106 Dallas TX 75390 214-645-4673
Christopher Stroud, M.D. 11123 Parkivew Plaza Drive Suite 101 Fort Wayne IN 46845 2609695071	Mark Richey, M.D. 1200 Airport Heights Ste 205 Anchorage AK 99508 9072724443	Arnold Advincula, M.D. Florida Hospital Celebration Health 400 Celebration Place Celebration FL 34747 (407) 303-4573

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