Monday, January 28, 2008

Recovering

Recovering from laparoscopic gallbladder surgery is a lot like being pregnant, right down to the fashions.

That's right, I've been wearing my maternity jeans the last couple of days. I was so bloated from the surgery that my regular ones didn't fit, and the maternity jeans probably put less pressure on one of my incisions (there are four small ones) than the others would. I guess I should be grateful the maternity jeans are too big on me. ;)

It's also a lot harder to bend over or get objects off of the floor, just as it was in my last trimester. If I need to do either of those things, I try to kneel. But I seem to be doing pretty well given that my surgery was less than a week ago. My digestive system is in the process of adjusting, and my side aches off and on, especially if I've been doing stuff, but otherwise I feel all right. I went to a baby shower yesterday for a family friend of Eugene's, and people were surprised I attended. (They played a game in which people had to eat ice cream...without utensils...from a diaper. Yum!) I stayed home today because I had to wait a few days before I could drive. I'm not sure yet if I should go to work tomorrow or stay home and try to rest. (Ha!) I could probably work, but I have to be careful not to push myself too much too soon.

It's a little difficult tending to Alex. Eugene and my dad (who came down today to help me) have been doing most of the lifting. I can hold Alex on my lap, but I have to change how I hold him so he doesn't press against the incisions. I can carry Alex if I need to, but carrying him in the car seat will be awkward. Bathing him is probably out of the question for now.

I go in Friday for a follow-up appointment. Hopefully that will go well, though it will be a while yet before I'm back to my normal routine.

Friday, January 25, 2008

Goodbye Gallbladder

A couple of months after first learning about my gallstones, I finally had my gallbladder removed yesterday. I just got home from the hospital a couple of hours ago.

I had to be at the hospital very early, at 7:00 a.m. Since we weren't sure when Alex would be up, I took a cab to the hospital so Eugene could stay home with our son. (It turned out that Alex was up when I left, but at least this way he didn't have to go out in the cold.) I didn't have to worry about my pedicure at all; they gave me socks to wear for my entire stay, so polish on my toenails wasn't an issue. (They did check my circulation via fingertip, though.) I remember a nurse rolling me down a corridor as I got my knockout dose, and then the next thing I remember was waking up in the Recovery Room. Apparently the surgery itself went well. I have some pictures they took of my gallbladder after they removed it. It turned out that I had lots of little stones in my gallbladder; I counted over 40 of them. Was that a gallbladder or a gizzard? ;) I was still groggy and a bit nauseous most of yesterday afternoon, but by the evening I was able to keep liquids down (though it did take longer to pass them, but I'm sure you don't want me to get into too much detail about that.) By morning, I was able to eat solids and walk around, even though I still had some pain. The whole day became one of waiting for my surgeon to make rounds, which didn't happen until about 4:30. At least she was able to discharge me. I was going through Alex withdrawal. I don't know how much he missed me, but he gave me a big smile when Eugene picked me up.

It's going to be a few more days before I'm able to drive, so I have to take Monday off as well, maybe longer, depending on how I feel. I'm allowed to lift up to 20 pounds, so I will be able to lift Alex once I've healed a bit more. For now, I'm just glad to be home with my family and to no longer worry about my time bomb of an organ.

Writing: A couple of months ago, I mentioned how I'd submitted a funny anecdote about wedding planning to an anthology. Well, it looks like that one is on hold. I have no idea if they will use my piece if they do publish the anthology. At least I've found out that the dragon anthology with my first published short story will be out in May (hopefully in time for WisCon). Time to book a room for the convention and see if I can sign up for programming. I'll also have to talk to the editor to see how to get some anthologies for the con.

Sunday, January 20, 2008

Pretty, Cold Feet

Yes, I've been a bad blogger. There hasn't been a lot to blog about; the days have been pretty routine. Get up, take care of Alex, get ready for work, bring Alex to daycare, work, pick him up, play with him/get dinner ready/put Alex to bed, unpack a box or two, relax, go to bed. Rinse, lather, repeat.

Today was different in that I had a spa day scheduled. It was supposed to be on Monday, since I have the day off and daycare is open, but there was a miscommunication when I set up the appointments. Good thing Eugene was able to watch Alex today. The first thing I had scheduled was an eyebrow shaping/facial. I put my clothes--all umpteen layers of them--into a locker and changed into a robe. The facial was nice and relaxing, since it also included some massage. After I was done, I returned to the locker room to put my clothes on before my haircut. Unfortunately, I could only find one sock. I'm not sure what happened; perhaps the missing sock fell into the locker below. I had to leave the other sock off; as wierd as I am, even I don't want to go around with one sock on and one sock off. It didn't matter for my haircut or even my pedicure, since they gave me disposable sandals to wear until the nail polish dried. The pedicure was the last thing I had done, and the polish wasn't dry when I left. So I wound up going outside in very cold weather in bare feet. At least it gave me a good excuse to shop for a while at a store next door to the spa until I could wear my normal shoes. The ironic part about the whole thing? The main reason I got a pedicure was because of the surgery on Thursday; after all, if you're going to have strangers looking at your internal organs while you're unconscious, it's reassuring to have your outside groomed. But despite that, they may have to remove the nail polish to monitor my circulation during the surgery. Ah well, good thing I didn't splurge on a manicure as well.

Writing: My short story is boggin down. Sigh. It started out about one thing but morphed into something else during drafting. That's fine, but now I'm not sure where I'm going with it. I'm putting it to the side for a while to work on my NaMoWriMo novel. At least that's going well for now.

I've been meaning to add a link to another blog for a while now, so I'm going to go ahead and do it. This one is a blog for another local NaMoWriMo writer. I've offered her some feedback on her novel (since she's much faster than I am), and I still need to look at her revised first chapter. I should go do that now....

Thursday, January 10, 2008

New House, Same Gallbladder

Lots of news to catch up on.

The biggest news is that we moved into the new house this weekend. A co-worker of mine was kind enough to round up a few of his friends and help us move the furniture. There's still a bunch of small stuff in the kitchen, bathroom, and closets that has to be moved, but Eugene and I have been gradually bringing some of that over after work every day. If we can get some more help, we should be done by this weekend.

So far, the house is still very much decorated in early Cubism (boxes everywhere), but we're working on getting the boxes unpacked too. It makes for a long day, as we can't get much done until Alex goes to bed. But it's so much nicer to have the room and decent appliances. Perhaps decent is an overstatement; we already had to have the kitchen faucet replaced. This was an item we found during inspection; I just didn't expect the faucet to break within a couple days of moving in. Still, we're very happy to be in the house and are enjoying making it our own.

I was supposed to have my gallbladder removed yesterday, but it had to be delayed. I developed (believe it or not) tonsilitis last week but didn't realize it until I went to the Urgent Care clinic on Sunday. (At first I thought it might have been strep throat, but the symptoms didn't seem to match. Then I thought it was just another of my bad colds and was waiting for it to improve. No such luck.) I'm currently on two types of drugs for the tonsilitis, and I'm feeling much, much better. I still have to wait a couple of weeks for the drugs to clear my system so I can have the surgery. It's annoying to wait (I can't even have herbal tea for the next couple of weeks), but at least this gives me time to build up my reserves for the recovery.

Somehow in the middle of all of this I've started a new short story. It's about halfway done; I know how I want to finish it, so I just need to sit down and work on it. If I can post it quickly enough to OWW, I could revise it and send it out during Broad Universe's mailing party at the end of the month. Of course, I can always do it later, but it would be nice to be part of the party.

Speaking of writing, I need to add a link to a friend's blog. Hopefully I can do that once we have phone service.

That's it for now.

Site Meter