The day of my hysterectomy

 I had panicked and recorded voice notes for my husband and children just in case. I had gone through the children's education and how to submit their work knowing I would be unable to do it post op for a little while and my husband would need to keep on top of that. I had gone through how our finances work again so he could keep up with that too. 

Going in for the operation I was convinced it woukd be cancelled. In my head it wasn't going to happen. Even as the nurse put my gown and stocking on me and the team of doctors and anaesthetist spoke to me about the procedure, checked I was having my cervix and ovaries out and got me to sign the consent form, I was sure it woukd still be cancelled. 

The porter turned up to the me to anaesthetics and the operating theatre, in my head it still wasn't happening. 

Then they put a canula needle in the back of my hand as I lay on the operating bed in the anaesthesia room. An oxygen mask was put on my face and someone pinched my neck. Then the anaesthetist pushed a liquid into my canula and I don't remember anything else.

I woke up to someone telling me to stop pulling my catheter out. I was shaking uncontrollably but not cold and was lying on my side in a hospital bed with a nurse next to me. I had a catheter strapped to my leg, nasal oxygen, a maternity pad stuffed between my legs, a huge belly and a machine squeezing my lower legs. The nurse was checking my blood pressure, temperature and pulse regularly and offered me pain relief but I was OK. This went on a little until the shaking stopped. Then I waited an hour for space on the post op ward. 

On the ward the nurses checked my observations vitals regularly but I developed a temperature. First they took blankets off me, then added a fan, then the doctor  came and I was given blood tests and a blood gas and put on IV antibiotics. I also had a bee sting injection in my leg to stop blood clots. I was being told to drink lots so went through two jugs of water and a jelly I had brought in. My throat was sore so I was glad to have some boiled mint sweets to help with that. My belly was extremely bloated. The fluorescent strip lights started to give me a migraine so I put my sun glasses on and asked if they could pull my   curtains around. They did for a little while but then someone else opened them. I had to keep the nasal oxygen on because my sats dropped too low when they took it away.

I had bad period cramp pain so had IV paracetamol in the evening. Then at night I had more paracetamol tablets for the pain and discomfort. Overnight I started farming which was a relief with the terrible bloating. Apparently to do a laparoscopy they inflate your abdomen with gas. Then they leave the gas in there. So it has to come out. 

My migraine got really bad but my eye mask, ear buds and the paracetamol helped. 

In the morning the catheter was taken out, the leg squeezes stopped and I needed a wee. I didn't have my wheelchair so had to ask a nurse to get it for me. They took ages so I had to ask again. When they brought it and parked it at the foot end of my bed I honestly didn't know how I was going to get to it. It felt so far and my belly was so bloated, I needed a wee, I had pain and noone was there to help me. I knew I shouldn't be lifting anything heavy but I had no choice but to lift myself to move down the bed without flashing anyone and then lift myself into my wheelchair. In the bathroom I had to lift myself on and off the toilet, made more tricky with them wanting me to put a cardboard bowl into the toilet and pee in that so they could measure it. For the first day or so I was weeing bloody coloured wee. That stopped then and it went back to normal.

I was allowed to go hone because I had farted, my temperature had come down a bit, I had peed enough and I had my injections to have nightly for a week, my antibiotics and my paracetamol for pain relief. 

The journey hone was horrific. The pot holes and speed bumps were all magnified by the position of my wheelchair over the rear axle and my bloated belly. I held myself as still as possible with my arms braced on each edge of the car. The seatbelt was up near my chest well away from my belly. 

I had little energy and slept a lot for the first week. I had a shower with the help of my carer the day after being home. She took the wound dressings off for me and we discovered I had reacted to the tape used and had some blistering around them. Every movement made my belly hurt. It was so uncomfortable.

Over about 4 days the bloating wore off but then the antibiotics made me sick. That wore off on day 11 post surgery. Then I was recovering from being sick and the operation. With chronic illnesses that is a lot.

Hysterectomy when disabled

 We got back from holiday on Juky 26th and there were a pile of letters waiting to be opened. Two were from the hospital so took priority over the rest. One was to invite me for pre op screening at the pre assessment centre in the local hospital. The second was a date for my hysterectomy, just 5 weeks away.

I had no more information than that, noone to ask or talk it through with. No mention of how it woukd he done, recovery times, extra help transferring to and from my wheelchair, about the procedure...nothing.

The first appointment was a form filling exercise where the nurse managed to write someone else's hospital number on my notes. I also had blood tests done by two ladies who were more interested in the oats they had just eaten than me.

I was told to return 5 days before the operation date for another blood test because, despite me having three children and therefore having my blood type discovered, the hospital had no record of it and couldn't take my word for it. 

Then I got a phone all two days later to go in and speak to an anaesthetist. I have trouble swallowing and have terrible acid reflux because my oesophagus doesn't work properly. The anaesthetist seemed to think that if I eat lots of protein and do lots of exercise then I will be able to walk post op. He said this to me and my husband whilst I was sat there in my wheelchair with chronic fatigue syndrome, fibromyalgia, functional neurological disorder lots more and cannot walk. So according to him a total hysterectomy was going to make me walk. I'm glad he wasn't doing the operation. 

Happy new year 2021

I can't believe I haven't written here since autumn.

Things have got worse for me medically, which has impacted on my mental health. I am always trying to keep it together, especially over Christmas. 

One of the more recent things we have tried here has been making colour changing lemonade. It was meant for gin, but that doesn't agree with the morphine. Besides, my children can try the lemonade too. 

inside a pretty box were these blue pea flowers. We added them to the lemonade, waited, waited..... And then the liquid was a deep purple.

On adding alcohol slowly (8 year old with a bottle of brandy), the liquid turned more pinkish. Tada!

Also this week. We had a blanket of snow fall during twixmas, then more the next day.

The kids and husband had snowball fights, built a snowman and repeated the snowball fight the next day. 

Our children have enjoyed throwing snowballs for our dopey staffy x to catch. Bless. 

Snow is the best free plaything the world sends us. 

Our Christmas has been lovely. With no extended family, it is always a quiet day. If anything, it was busier than usual with friends of our children coming over everyday. 

We are in tier 4 so are only allowed to meet in our support bubbles. We made sure, back in March last year, one friend is in our support bubble and the other, who practically lives here, is in our childcare bubble. 

We have done our best throughout to keep everyone safe. 

Stay safe xx

Autumn 2020

With the Tier 2 of covid-19 in force in our local area, Tier 3 all around, we are sticking local as much as we can. We have been staying in more again, keeping strictly to the rule of six, including only our support bubble and childcare bubble. 

Now we have a better handle on the restrictions than when we had during the first peak in the UK, we are able to cater for our children’s needs better, despite the restrictions in place. (But when the government decide to chenge things with only a day or two's notice, that seriously does not help).

It is Halloween this weekend. Our girls love getting dressed up and going trick or treating every year. This year, although it is not banned, I don’t feel it is a good or sensible idea to be going to other people’s doors, taking treats from them and then potentially taking the virus door to door.

I have prepared a picture treasure hunt for the girls to do, a pumpkin hunt and prize bags for them all. On top of that, there are some halloween games for them to play too, with prizes again. I plan on putting Hotel transylvania on the TV whilst they have waffles and/or pancakes with alien slime sauce (Home Bargains), ‘Witches’ blood’ (fruit jam), ‘Sticky zombie pus’ (syrup) and ‘Bat Juice’ (chocolate spread). 

I was thinking of repeating the food from a few years ago. We had mashed potato with sausages stood up in it. I dyed the potato blue and cut a piece of sausage skin off one end, put a piece of fried onion there and called the dish ‘Witches’ fingers in alien mash’. It didn’t go down very well at all. So we might just stick to jacket potatoes and chipolatas this time, no colouring.

I want the girls to have the opportunity to go outside in their costumes, although they already have been to a Halloween event and shown off their costumes…..it would be nice for them if their other friends could see them. So, if the weather forecast improves i might try and hide (ask Hubby to hide…) some of the pumpkins outside and around the street a bit (accepting that they may well get taken by other little Halloween creatures).

Away from Halloween, we have also been looking for fireworks. They have been going off around here for a couple of weeks already. Our dogs, cats and daughters aren’t keen. We have lavender for the animals, to help them remain calmer, but for our daughters, we have been looking for the ideal firework package.

I am hoping it will still be available, but it is in Aldi. They have a package which only contains quieter (sadly not silent) ground based fireworks and a catherine wheel. These are far less scary for our children and can be easily watched from behind the house windows if needed.

Aside from these annual dates, Hubby and i have been trying to keep our minds busy by watching TV together. I have found Gogglebox t be useful for finding new programmes recently. I have watched The Handmaid’s tale on Amazon prime video. I can’t believe it was written in 1985. It certainly made me think abut things. I have had an interesting and difficult relationship with christianity ue to my adopted parents, but a lot of what was portrayed in these episodes certainly rang true from my own past experiences. Obviously not to the same extremes, but the division is felt, the shame and indignation also present. I think everyone should watch it if they have, or have had, any relationship with the church. People with money, or very kind friends, are already able to use a surrogate. Nothing to the lengths shown in this programme or described in the original novel.

Through no desired link, we have also watched A Brave New World. I remember having to study this in high school and hating it. Watching the series makes it far more accessible. 

Both of these views of the possible future for mankind, by different authors, are concerning. I would hope that neither is the truth, but who knows. There are certainly some strange things going on already.

Our current watch is Riviera. It is making me wish we were on holiday in the south of France. I long for the heat, the sound of the cicadas, swimming in the pools etc. But staying safe has to take precedence this year.

Our children all have plans for New years’ Eve, to say goodbye to this year. Hopefully next year will be better. Or perhaps we will all have become conditioned by then.

Halloween Crazy

 Well.....since I booked tickets for us to go to a Halloween Scarefest (family friendly), we have all been on a countdown to Halloween.

We took our friend (in our childcare bubble) to the National Forest Adventure Farm for Spudfest this year. We all enjoyed it so much, we booked for Halloween the next day. It is such a great day out for families, and for those with additional needs there is plenty of space, huge choice of activities and something for everyone. Even now, with the Covid-19 restrictions in place, numbers are limited, staff are cleaning constantly, there is handgel all around to compliment the soap and water sinks available too. We felt safe there, and that says a lot.

I feel really sorry for the children who love halloween this year though. They can't go trick or treating, can't have all their friends over and so I'm not sure what Halloween will be like for everyone in 2020.

Our house was decorated inside as soon as the tickets were booked (October 1st). The girls have put up 3D faces on the walls, hanging pumpkins, halloween bunting and other decorations throughout the house. I have bought patterned paper to make paper chains, but have put it somewhere safe- a lethal and silly mistake on my part.

There is even a skeleton who's foot gets stuck in the cutlery draw repeatedly (just as well it can't feel any more!).

The scarefest was yesterday. With coronavirus, bookings were for one of the two daily sessions. The girls wanted to have their faces painted and to go in halloween costumes. Thankfully, they both agreed to wear jumpers and coats to stay warm too. 

It took me over an hour to paint their faces, but I do think they both looked good.

 I booked the afternoon session because we all have trouble with sleeping lately. It meant we had four hours (the same as if we had got there for the morning session) to explore the mummy maize maze, enter the haunted mirror maze house, pick pumpkins from the field (catching a lift on the tractor), feed the farm animals, enter the musical maze, bounce on  the giant pillow, see the broomstick training, go on the funfair rides and have free time to explore whilst hubby and I tried to havea hot drink together (once we were certain they all knew their way around and where we were).

We had chips for lunch with hot drinks all round- we needed them to warm up from the icy wind. 

There was a demon wandering about, handing out medals to children who were scarily dressed. Since he was mainly targerting the younger children, ours were getting upset. I hoped that explaining their additional needs to him would help. He was great- he played a little game with them and let them win a medal each. Phew!

As usual, their goats were adorable. The guinea pigs got a fuss, cows, pigs and goats were fed and cuddled, then we returned outside. 

I knew, as soon as I saw the maize maze, that I would be the one to get lost in there. Miss A got a stitch so was walking with me (on speed 2) with hubby too. I managed a couple of circles inside the maze, lost our friend and Miss G, entered a second field through an open gate, where the maze continued, and continued to be lost until I saw our friend K coming to rescue us and reunite us all again.

Driving over the large lumps of stones and gravel has left my shoulders and back painful today- so much so that I didn't want to go to sleep last night. I figured it might not hurt so much if  I didn't have to wake up. That logic didn't work though- my medication and a long day combined to help me sleep by 3.30am.

Today they are waiting for the paint on their pumpkins to dry out so they can add a second layer and paint faces or patterns on them. We have two very large pumpkins on our dining table. One pink and one white right now. Miss G chose a smaller, green pumpkin and has decided not to paint hers.

I have promised to buy some pumpkins to make soup with, and we are all going pumpkin picking again on thursday too. Hopefully those pumpkins will last until halloween.

We are having a Halloween party here, within our covid bubble. I have got a sort of treasure hunt ready, my friend has some games and I need to find some more activities they can get up to aswell.  Wish us luck 😉

(and the countdown has begun to the Christmas event at the farm too #NFAF )