Three For Me Pre-Surgery Blog....

Well, tomorrow is the big day....just 12 more hours until my stomach is going to be chopped and diced in Dr. Houston's Cuisinart!!  I can't believe that it is going to happen tomorrow.  But, I am SO ready!!

I have been on my clear liquid diet for two days....I have learned the following:  (1) no amount of sugar free jello can fill you up; (2) You will thank the stars for beef and chicken broth in the evening on Day 1; (3) plain old decaf coffee with Splenda will seem like a treat; (4) my husband can'****ch me bite into a frozen popsicle without cringing (5) Kids think that a diet of jello, popsicles and soup is something else!  and (5) the pre-op diet exists not to clean your bowels & empty your stomach, but, rather, to make you BEG the surgeon to chop up your stomach so that you are not hungry anymore.

So, that is what I have learned on my pre-op journey.  I can't believe tomorrow is the BIG day!  I am not afraid, just anticipating it.  I wonder if I will sleep tonight...doesn't really matter because I better be sleeping tomorrow (can you say med-mal?)!

I want to take a moment to be serious (so hard for me!), because the pre-op journey that I have already been on, from August 2008 to today, has been so enlightening for me.  I have learned a lot about fate. A lot about determination.  A lot about support.  I have looked forward each day to checking the TN Message Board and seeing what was going on & I have learned so much from each person who has posted.  I am amazed at this group of people and I have such joy knowing that there is truly a pure kindness of strangers.  Thanks to everyone who has laughed with me, answered my questions and been such great online friends during this time.

I am looking forward to a day when this is all just an exciting memory and I am chasing my kids around the yard or the park and the day when I walk by a  mirror and see who I really am.  I don't view this surgery and coming post-op journey as a "birth" because I would never want to erase everything that has made me what I am today.  I don't want to be reborn, but, instead, feel a sense of pride in knowing that each and every day I am trying to make myself the best person, wife, mom and friend that I can be.

Until then, I am going to go drink a pork-chop......happy (early) St. Paddy's Day to everyone. xo, Micheala.