TAH: Scared I will bleed to death

Hey sweetie, I know only too well how anxious we can get. After serious panic attacks, I am now on anti anxiety meds and they are helping me, dont suffer with this, go and speak to your doctor. Remember, you have so many sisters now, and they are all here for you! With lots of love xoxoxoxo

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Originally Posted by Gosport Fox Hello Sisters, I have heard and read about people losing pints of blood during operations and when I first knew I would be having a hysterectomy I was very scared that this would happen to me. Today I met one of my late mother's neighbours who told me that her partner had lost two pints of blood during a knee replacement operation. Straight away my fear came back. I do not fully understand how patients can lose pints of blood during operations as I thought that the main blood vessels were temporarily closed off during an operation. I am worried because due to my huge fibroid I will be having a long vertical incision - so lots of scope for bleeding! I also hope to have a spinal because of my phobia of general anaesthetic, so now I am picturing myself bleeding to death and being fully aware of it! My mother died in the summer and I suppose this is giving me a greater sense of my own mortality. It's been a hard year.

First of all (((HUGS))) to you. We all have our individual fears to overcome. Mine dealt with loosing my cervix and sex not being the same and that my husband wouldn't feel the same towards me afterwards. I also was afraid of getting an infection post-op. Sometimes hearing others fears help- I can tell you neither one has proven true and I'm almost 3 weeks post-op. I can't say about the sex part yet as its too early but so far everything is working the same as before.

As for you fears... Not everyone looses pints of blood during the surgery. I didn't loose much at all so you can come through this without loosing much blood. As for the story of the knee replacement bone surgeries are notorious for being very bloody and for their blood loss. They actually developed a system that saves the blood lost from a single patient so the patient can get their own blood back if they loose too much. That system was designed with bone surgeries in mind. Granted every surgery has a risk involved with blood loss but rest assured the surgeon will have blood on standby if he feels you may or may not need it. (My doctor did a type and crossmatch prior to surgery and had 2 units ready just in case. He wasn't overly worried but it does happen with surgery so he had me type and cross matched just in case. If you don't need the units that are reserved for you it goes back into circulation to be used by another patient.)

As for how they loose blood, sometimes it is a surprise of hitting of blood vessel, sometimes it is where the organ or part of body to be operated on is located and sometimes the person is just prone to bleeding. It happens for a number of reasons sometimes part of the procedure, sometimes part of the patients health and sometimes a miss on the part of the surgeon- remember just because we expect them to heal everything they are still human. They are great at what they do but humans are never perfect.

As for your fear with being fully aware- chances are they are going to give you something to help you relax via IV so you aren't as aware of the smells and sounds of surgery but are still awake. If you have fears explain to your surgeon before hand. Call the doctors office and they may be able to help relieve your fears. You aren't the first person that has or has had this fear and you won't be the last. Be sure to tell the anesthesiologist. They will be up by your head during the procedure and may be able to talk to you and help calm your fears during the procedure.

Take care and be nice to yourself over the next couple of weeks. Look forward to seeing you on the other side of the boards- the post-op section.

I was pretty scared of bleeding during surgery, too. I needed transfusions when I was 5 after having my tonsils out. I bled a lot after nasal and dental surgery but didn't need transfusions. Before my LEEP a few months ago, my GYNO ordered a test for von Willebrands Desease, which is a clotting disorder, which it turns out I don't have. Anyway, I made sure everyone was very aware that I tend to bleed, being quite afraid that they wouldn't be prepared.

Anyway, I went through my LAVH with no problems what-so-ever. I did have a small gush of blood the first time I got up for the loo after surgery, but nothing after that. I guess that was just a little bit of pooled blood left over from surgery. There was no hint of excessive bleeding at all. I know know, maybe it's just neck and up that I bleed alot. And I know surgical techniques have come a long was since I had my tonsils out 40 years ago.

Like others have said, they are prepared just incase, and one of the things they do before surgery is do a blood test which, among other things, allows them to know what type of blood they need to have on hand if anything does go a bit wrong. Hang in there. You will get though this *hugz*