(This is part 2 of a series. Click here to read part 1)
On Friday, July 23, after a nerve wracking morning of waiting and with nothing but butterflies in my stomach, Hannah drove me to Good Samaritan hospital in Lafayette, CO. This wasn't my normal hospital and it was a good 20 minute drive from home and I had never been there before, but we arrived safely and pretty close to being on time. (We got a bit lost amongst the many parking lots trying to find the right building.)
When we arrived, there was a lady standing near the front door who took our temperatures, checked my name on her list, and then sent us upstairs to the surgery waiting area. When we arrived upstairs, the lady at the desk there asked for my paperwork and when she discovered I didn't have anything, she sent us back downstairs to registration. There we found a lady who checked us in, scanned my ID and insurance cards, asked a ton of questions about my phone number, my address and SSN, my next of kin and living wills. Then she had me sign a whole bunch of forms to say I allowed them to do what they would and they wouldn't tell anyone, but I would pay for it and I wouldn't sue them if it didn't turn out well. (I scanned through most of the documents... I hope I didn't sign away my soul as well.) Then she escorted us back upstairs where we were allowed to hang out until they were ready for me.
When the nurse came for me, she got my weight, a urine sample and then had me change into a hospital gown. Then she took my blood pressure, and clamped an oxygen monitor to my finger. She hooked up an IV (in my right arm because the vein in my left arm wasn't working), and asked a bunch of questions regarding my medical history and medications and stuff. Every once in a while someone would come in and introduce themselves as the person who would do the anesthesia, or the person who would monitor my vocal chords during the surgery. We had arrived at the hospital around 11am, and they told me the surgery was scheduled for 1pm. That time came and went, and my doctor - the one who would actually do the surgery - hadn't arrived yet. So when everything else was ready to go, we sat and waited. And listened to my empty stomach growl. And waited. The nurse came in to tell me he had called and he was running late but he was on his way. And so we waited a bit more. Finally the doctor arrived. He came in and asked a few more questions, and shortly after that I said goodbye to Hannah and they wheeled me towards the operating room. I remember the anesthesiologist holding something to my face and telling me to breathe... and then nothing.
Some hours later, I woke up without a thyroid, and with fewer lymph nodes than I'd had before. My mind was foggy, and it took me a little while to fully wake up. I had a bunch of gauze wrapped around my neck like a Shakespearean collar and my throat was sore and scratchy, but other than that I didn't feel too bad. After a while they let Steven and Hannah come in to see me, and then they wheeled me out of the recovery room and into a private room where I would stay the night for observation.
The first twenty-four hours after surgery, my biggest complaint was my throat, which was sore and scratchy from the tube they had put down it for the anesthesia. While I preferred softer foods, I could swallow fairly normally. I learned quickly to try not to cough or sneeze, though - that was less than comfortable. The first night they gave me some extra strength Tylenol for the pain, although really the incision itself didn't particularly hurt. It itched more than anything and I didn't bother with any more pain medication.
One concern they had was with the amount of calcium in my blood; apparently calcium is regulated by the parathyroid, which was disturbed during the surgery and my calcium levels weren't as high as they should have been. As a result, they dosed me with Tums and took a blood sample every six hours until my calcium levels went back up where they should be which meant I had to stay an additional night in the hospital. Having my blood taken every six hours wasn't fun. They couldn't take it from the spot where the IV was, so they took it from veins in my hands or wherever else they could. One lab tech was determined to take blood from my left elbow: she had the needle in the vein and it wasn't drawing blood properly, but she kept messing with it until she managed to get what she wanted, but left me with a beautiful bruise in the process.
Another frustration I had while in the hospital was with the IV monitor. The IV was in the crook of my elbow, so whenever I bent my elbow too much, the monitor would complain and beep until I could get a nurse to come in and turn it off. After about 24 hours and 3-4 alarms, one nurse finally showed me which button I could press that would silence the alarm for a few minutes at a time while I waited for someone to come in and turn it off. It wasn't until the alarm went off about an hour before I went home that a nurse finally showed me what to do to reset it myself.
Steven and Peter came to visit for a little while on Saturday. Peter brought me a stuffed monkey to keep me company and wrote a joke on the nurse's board in my room (What do you call a unicorn that has gotten all of its shots? An immunicorn!).
Overall, I enjoyed my stay in the hospital. Besides the IV alarm going off, and the nurses coming in and out giving me meds, taking blood and checking my blood pressure, it was fairly quiet. I had plenty of time to read and play games on my tablet. The food was decent. All the same, when Steven came for me and they finally allowed me to check out early Sunday afternoon, it was good to return home again.
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