Back in the saddle again...sort of...
Well, finally feeling well enough to attempt a post here...
Does anyone remember me? My WLS was done 11/19, by Dr. Bryan Freeman in Anniston, AL. He tried to do the surgery lap, but because of two crappy hernia repairs and an old blood clot the size of his fist cozily nestled between the repairs (done with mesh), he had to go open. The WLS took only 45 min, but the cleaning up of my abdominal wall -- removing old adhesions, taking the hernia repairs OUT and making me a new linea alba, teasing apart scar tissue -- took 3 hrs!
Then after that, and because of my utter pig-headedness at insisting on surgery only a week after I'd been in a car wreck, my body hollered ENOUGH!!!! and decided to take a short break, meaning my kidneys decided to stop working for the most part. Add to that protesting muscle spasms in my abdomen and sides, blood pressure bottoming out, and fluids not going into the cells but into the spaces between (a phenomenon known as "third spacing"), and I was one sick puppy for 5 days after the surgery. Then all of a sudden everything started working like it should, and I went home 6 days after surgery.
But not for long. A wound infection settled into the top AND bottom of my incision, trying to meet somewhere in the middle. After treating it per dr's orders at home for a week, I went back to Dr. Freeman and tearfully asked to be put in the hospital to treat it, I was tired of the mess and the smell and the sheer grossness of it. He agreed, and I ended up spending 20 days back in the hospital, strangely enough right next door to my previous room. I had so many IV's done that they blew out everything in my right arm and did a fair job on my left; I ended up with a PICC line that went from my left biceps into my vena cava. Having THAT installed freaked me out!
I was hooked up to a new-fangled thingy called a Wound VAC, which is essentially a vacuum sucky thing that literally sucks the guck out of wounds and keeps the healing surfaces in contact so they heal up from the inside out. I called it my Vac-U-Suck. It sure did slurp out a lot of guck, which I called "Hell's Coffee". They ran CT scans to make sure I didn't have any other pockets o' pus lurking around, and found a nice bruise and fluid on the bottom of my left lung. Oh joy. Officially it's called an "atelectasis", and can lead to pneumonia. So I had that drained.
Has anyone ever had fluid drained off a lung? No? Well, take it from me, insist on some high powered sedatives -- it was HORRIBLE. Then they asked if I wanted to see what they'd drawn off... some 300 mL of "nice, clear, yellow fluid". NO THANK YOU. Just put me back in bed and let me whimper, there's a dear.
Eventually they got the right antibiotics running in -- gentamycin IV, levaquin IV, and Bactrim oral (in a yummy grape elixir!) -- and they sent me home 12/21 I think. I had home health in for a week changing the Vac-U-Suck dressings, which I came home with, then the second week home my wounds decided to start healing and Dr. Freeman discontinued the vacuum therapy. Now, I've been home 3 weeks, the bottom abscess is almost totally healed and the top one is getting there.
So maybe NOW I can get my life back on track! I have lost 60+ pounds since surgery, down from 333 to 275, which is great. I just wish I hadn't had so many complications...
Lorri
My God, Lorri! What an ordeal!! As you described all that, I could almost FEEL it! You poor thing! Thank GOD you are now on your way to healing, finally! I had wondered about you, as I had remembered your posts from before. It is so good to see you back with us here, and on the 'losing' side. You are ONE TOUGH LADY!!!
Please know that I am lifting you up in my thoughts and prayers as you continue your recovery, and I pray that it is going to be a swift one from here on in.
God bless you!
Pat