That was a DOOZIE!

The night leading up to the big day I was definately scared...waves of strength, anxiety, peace and panic flashed in and out of my body. The morning of, I woke up at 4am, listened to my pre-surgical meditation CD and had my antibiotic shower. I was terrified, and sad. Also excited for all of these feelings to be gone once and for all. I walked into the hospital, got into a gown, was told to wash again with the pink anitbacterial soap anf went out to the waiting room to wait. That's when panic hit. I felt like I was going to throw up and I started crying....I looked around and wished I was the other people getting a wrist surgery or a minor thing like that. But I wasn't, I was me and here I was.
Sfter trying to convince the interviewer to give me Adivan (she said no) and answering a million questions I have already answered before...my surgeon decided to mark me with his JIFFY. While he did this he took photos and reassured me I would be ok...when they took me into the operating room, it was small and stuffy and very cold. I layed on the table and they gave me and IV and I asked if I would be getting an epidural and he said "No, we don't really do that much anymore, there isn't much point" and next I knew, I was out cold.
I had tried visualizing a 6 hr surgery for myslef. I didn't want it to be too long...so I thought I could convince my body to cooperate and keep it short. I was wrong, it was 12 hours long.
I woke up to the feeling of chaos, moving and lot's of voices. Instatntly, I vomited...I began gagging and wretching, and yo can imagine, after having your ab muscle removed from your body, that didn't feel very great...they cleaned me and tugged at me and lifted me, and finally I was in a bed able to feel relativley comfortable. The clock read 9:45. It wasn't very fun. I stayed in the recovery room for the first 2 nights because they needed to watch me and there wasn't any beds in the ICU. It's not very nice there, but my first nurse was awesome. So sweet. I wish these "special nurses" knew how we felt about them, but before you know it they are gone and there is a new one. I have had 3 awesome and 2 terrible and a fe in between....
I have since been moved to the SCCU (surgical coronary critical unit) so that they can monitor me closely. They want to make sure my new "flaps" (new boobs) take to my body. They come every hour and tap on then to see what color they are.
Moving has been hard...the first time I stood up was so painful, I thought I couldn't do it again....then I slept and did it the next day and moved to a chair and then today I walked a bit, sat in a chair and had 2 dangling moments with my feet off of the bed. I feel good about it, though I am nervous about how I will be able to leave here and go home in 3-4 days and function. I am also nervous about them taking my drains out. So far I have 6 drains...2 on each side of my breast and on on each side of my belly. I heard it hurts to have them removed. I hope I am wrong on this one. Staying in this ward in nice. I have a private room and a personal nurse, though no one other than immediate family can visit me here, and there are a few pwople I would like visits from, but not until I get moved to my public room, hopefully tomorrow.
I will keep writing to keep you up dated, but life is pretty boring here, I sleep 85% of the time and the rest I am getting needles, meds, drains cleaned, catheder drained...blah blah blah. However! The morphine makes for wicked dreams!!
Ciao for now,
Dreamer