So where was I? Oh yes, sleeping the day away….
The KoD went to the waiting area to daven and to wait until surgery was finished. We had been told that once I had been moved to recovery the Doctor would go talk to him and he would be brought back to see me.
My lovely friend G6, who lives not too far from the hospital, recounts that morning for us – better she tell it, as she was there! I knew she was going to stop by before work to bring coffee to the KoD and make sure he was ok – none of us realized how long she would end up staying.
More or less in her words:
Ok, let’s see…..
I came around 8:30, thinking that I’d be there about half an hour. –HSM: and you wore pink, right, in my honour? Just like so many of my tweeps and FB peeps.
I figured the 90 minute surgery started at 7:30, right? So I’d be there till 9 or so and get into work just a tad behind schedule. (There are some advantages to being the boss, right 😉 ? )
The KoD and I shmoozed a bit and then another friend of ours, Sir Chants-a-lot, showed up toting breakfast for KoD. I think that was going to be the pattern for the day… Sir Chants-a-lot making sure the KoD got fed. (He brought dinner later, I think) – HSM: Yes m’dear. He brought Shwarma. Which smelled heavenly but being as I was nil by mouth I didn’t get to taste it but the KoD totally enjoyed it.
I made sure to tweet updates, but there wasn’t much happening and by 10:45, we were all trying to pretend we weren’t nervous for the other guy’s benefit 😉 – but we all WERE. –HSM: I cannot believe you guys stayed around…. Such good friends.
Sir Chants-a-lot took the KoD to get coffee and I stayed put ready to ambush the first doctor I saw.
When they returned, I told Sir Chants-a-lot to go find a pretty girl and shmooze her up and see if he could find out what was up ;). HSM says: the not knowing had to be driving you guys crazy.
I found none other than Darren – patient advocate – fresh off the farm from Kansas. He talked “real slow like” but put our minds at ease when he was able to call into the operating suite and informed us that the surgery started late (HSM: and they couldn’t have told you that earlier?) and they were only putting the implants (you had implants??? And you’re masquerading it as spinal surgery…. tsk tsk…..) in then and that the surgery would last another hour. HSM Note: BONE and titanium implants. But haha!
We all breathed a silent sigh of relief, still trying not to show the other how nervous we were. It WAS 11 am by then, you know……
At 12 pm Darren decided to take lunch, which was just peachy because it was right around the time that we’d be starting to get antsy again. The nerve….
There we were, fighting our demons silently, with Sir Chants-a-lot trying to lighten the moments with (dumb but much needed) penguin jokes. –HSM: remember any?
Nearly ANOTHER hour passed.
At this point, none of us was doing that great a job of hiding our anxiety. Sir Chants-a-lot accosted a sour looking “little old lady” patient advocate who after some investigation finally informed us that you were out of surgery. We all smiled and virtually patted each other on the back. It was kind of a “hugs” moment, but yeah…. no….. not happening……
We stayed until the doctor emerged to talk to KoD (one last photo op for the Twitter updates) and then figured he was in good hands and would see his Queen of Hearts shortly. –HSM: he saw me alright, but I remember nothing. Sigh.
Exit – stage left……….
Thanks G6 for that recap. Thanks also for leaving out the fact that when you visited me later that evening I must have repeated everything a million times. KoD doesn’t remind me of this either. You guys must love me or something.
The KoD came to sit with me in recovery until I was ready to go up to a room. I remember nothing of the afternoon. Apparently I was very sensitive to the anesthetic so it took me a loooooong time to wake up and stay woken up afterwards. As soon as I was sufficiently awake they took me to my room.
To be continued…..
In the Pink 
I sometimes think it would be a blessing to wake up slow, but thank goodness they’ve figured out the bit about administering a LOCAL anesthetic that doesn’t immediately wear off the second you wake up. See, I wake up instantly and generally in excruciating pain – meaning I want to kill the first person I see, as my addled brain blames THEM for whatever hurts so bad I want to kill or be killed. Modern medicine has finally figured out that most of us would prefer to wake up and GRADUALLY feel the post-op pain, so the last two surgeries were like a DREAM by comparison to having my tonsils out when I was 11 (still traumatized over the hour spent in the recovery room fighting the nurses after that one – they literally tied me to the bed rail because I refused to stay still on my side!!)
Hope you’re starting to feel a lot less pain now! And yes, you have wonderful friends – glad KoD had company!
i have only been under general anesthetic for one other surgery – appendectomy twenty years ago. I remember nothing from waking up then. But I was young and I healed fast. This time I woke up and was on a pain pump. It didn’t take me very long to figure out how to press that darn button!!
I stand corrected on my own post.
Sir Chants-a-lot informs me that it was a POLAR BEAR joke…. (not funny either way….)
Yep, I was totally listening……