Yesterday was my pre-admission clinic at the hospital. My appointment time was 9:45 a.m. - and I have to be honest I cut it pretty close. Without Paul around I'm more prone to being late than on time so I showed up at the check in desk at 9:44 a.m. Not late but not too early either.
They signed me in and showed me to a room where six other people were sitting. I thought "okay there are 7 of us about to have surgery". Nope there were four of us about to have surgery, I was the only person there alone. Well - one teenage boy had his Mom with him so that doesn't count but the other two gentlemen having surgery brought their wives.
Paul has guilt over it and I laugh cause really it would have been a really long day for him sitting around doing nothing.
The first thing that happened is two nice nurses came in and went through a fabulous slide show presentation. It had pictures from the 1950's of doctors with giant pimp mustaches smiling down at patients wearing make up and equipment from the stone age. Interesting note - the hospital gowns the patients were wearing in the old photos have not changed one bit from then to today. Hmmm..
Anyway, after the nurses go through a bunch of stuff like how you have to take off your nail polish before you come in and how you can't wear make up then they take you and sequester you into your own tiny exam room where you put on one of those fabulous snowflake gowns and wait.
The one nice thing about pre-admission - all the hospital specialists come to you while you sit in the room instead of you wandering around and doing tests all over the hospital. The first lady who saw me was EKG and she did a heart test on me. It honestly takes longer for them to put all the little sticky nodes all over your body than for the computer to run it's test.
While she was doing that the lab techs bust in and my room was full to the brim until EKG wheeled out with her computer. I had a student lab technician and I had no problems letting her take my blood. We all have to learn some time and she was very nice. The lab tech who was training her chatted with me while all the vials were filled up and then they fitted me with this lovely pink bracelet.
This beautiful pink bracelet must stay on from now until after the 29th when I have my surgery. It contains a blood bank number and if anything happens during surgery and I need blood - they'll give me back some of my own. Genius in my opinion. And even though it's a bit of a fashion risk it's waterproof and I don't have any problem wearing it for a week and a half. The lab tech did confide in me that some patients didn't take that relaxed of an approach to wearing the bracelet ie the stripper she took blood from yesterday. The lab tech whispered the word stripper and we both had a good laugh. I mean as long as it wasn't covering her nipple what was she worried about?
So the next person in was a very nice nurse named Pat. Complete with glasses that were looped by a gold chain around her neck. Loved it. Anyway, she went through all the surgical procedure stuff with me. Surgery is scheduled to take 3 hours and 44 minutes (I laughed and asked how my surgeon could be so exact - she explained that the surgeon types in the procedure and the computer spits out a time). I hope I'm not booted out of the OR if it takes 3 hours and 46 minutes - but I'll be asleep so really I won't remember anyway.
I'm scheduled to be in the hospital for five days and then she handed me my two bottles of CitroMag which is a lovely salty 7 up concoction that makes you wish you had a seat belt installed on your toilet. Why did I get two bottles you ask? Because I get to go through two days of bowel prep not just one. Fabulous, two days of broth and jell-o and running to the loo. And for all of you thinking there must be some other way - there is. I could have chosen the "Go Lightly" solution which has a lovely name but you have to drink four litres of it at a time. That's right four litres - the size of a giant jug of milk. No friggin' thank you - my CitroMag is only like 300 ml. And I'm not sure why they call it Go Lightly, I think that's some kind of cruel joke they play on patients. Anyone who isn't "in the know" when the doctor asks what kind of prep they want to do would probably pick that one because the name is so much nicer.
After the nurse visited I was seen by a doctor. Here's where it gets weird. I would like to start off by saying that I am very fluent in gibberish and usually have next to no problems with accents. This little guy was brown and besides a terrible accent and I couldn't make out a thing he was saying - wait for it - he had one eye that was totally crossed. That's right. One eye looked right at me and his other eye looked right across his face over his nose and towards the wall. So besides that fact I couldn't understand a word he said I couldn't even concentrate because his eye was so freaky.
Luckily for me Dr. Cross Eye managed to figure out I was having a hard time understanding and we got by on some sign language. About five minutes later another doctor came in and it turns out my cross eyed little brown guy was an intern and this other doctor was training him that day. New doctor didn't have a lick of accent and I figured out everything he was saying. He asked me if I was sick in any way other than my Crohn's I answered no I thought one incurable illness was enough and after looking through my paperwork announced that he didn't foresee me having any difficulties with the surgery.
Now came the wait - I had to have a visit from the ostomy nurse - she's the nurse who helps fit you with an ostomy bag, trains you how to take care of it and all that jazz. Turns out my surgeon who happens to be new to this hospital (even though he's not new to surgery) didn't even think to make those arrangements for me but nice nurse Pat with the glasses did. The tricky part - I had to wait for about an hour and a half before she showed. Good thing I brought in a good book.
So Donna - the ostomy nurse showed up - and by the way they are technically called ET nurses even though I have no idea what it means. Donna is wonderful, and she brought several books and an example of what my ostomy bag will look like.
For those of you who don't know an ostomy is where they take part of your intestine and have it pulled out through the skin of your stomach, then they fold it out like the cuff of a shirt sleeve and it heals and your body eliminates poop through that hole. A colostomy is when it's your large intestine is pulled out, an ileostomy is when it is your small intestine that is pulled out. Donna and I are unsure which one I'll wake up with - but she says if I have to have one I should hope for the colostomy. I'm going to take her word on that.
Next thing we did - she marked my tummy with two black x's - these are the appropriate sites for the ostomy when it's done. She assured me I certainly didn't want my surgeon picking a spot since I'll be lying unconscious on the bed and he won't be able to take into account how pants fit, how I sit and how I walk and what would be comfortable.
These black x's must also remain on my body for the next two weeks.
I don't know if you can see it in this picture but my two x's are covered by some clear bandages the kind they use like when you get an IV. So I'm all water-proofed up but I have to be careful not to let too much water wash over them or rub them off.
So basically after the x's I made fun of the pamphlets she gave me which were covered with pictures of very happy, very active senior citizens. Then she wrote her name and number in both books she gave me and told me to give her a call if I had any questions at all about the procedure before my operation.
By the way - Paul now calls my tummy the smiley face, he says if I just put a line under my belly button it would be complete.
I'm tired of writing now. I have had to go off all my medication to get ready for the surgery and I am starting to really feel the effects. A week and a half can't come soon enough.
