10 days post surgery

Today is Nov. 30-10 days since surgery (Belt Lipectomy-360* middle body lift). Things are going well. Lea had my kids the day or surgery, although David had off Friday (suprise free day off for a base goal day!), Jennie watched my kids for a bit while he came to bring up my medicine and visit with me for a few minutes and Saturday while he picked me up from the hospital, Stephanie had my kids on Monday and Tuesday (and took the two youngest grocery shopping!!! INSANE WOMAN!) and Diana had my kids overnight Tues- Wednesday. It has been such a blessing having everyone's support and I can't thank those of you enough! I returned home Saturday afternoon. I didn't come out of my room until Tuesday (bed to bathroom was all I could do every couple hours), then I slowly made it down the hall and back, and that was about it before needing a pain pill and a nap!!! I've slowly been progressing. Now I can actually make it down the hallway and spend some time sitting with the family for a few minutes before needing to back and lay down again, sometimes with a pain pill, sometimes just laying down will suffice.

I went to the Dr. on Wednesday. He's very pleased with the way things are going. Said just keep up what I'm doing. I have another appt. this Wednesday, I'm hoping he'll take the drains out and that will help with some of the pain, uncomfortability and "depression". I am trying to wean off the strong meds, so I'm not taking them much now. Still walking slow and hunch over a bit and often in a lot of pain, but it's all getting better daily. In two months they say I should be "back to normal". I deifinitly look forward to that!!!

David cooked a Turkey, made mashed potatoes and gravy for Thanksgiving dinner. Some of our friends prepared other pieces of the meal for us-greenbean casserole, orange/cranberry sauce, sweet potatoes and marshmellows and rolls. David did very well, thank God for explicit directions! LOL The whole meal was delicious and the family really enjoyed it. I came out for a bit and ate Thanksgiving dinner with everyone. And we've been enjoying the leftovers all day Friday and Saturday-but alas, the leftovers are now gone :( The kids are doing well. They come and cuddle and talk with me and ask me to read to them in my bed, and are happy when I come out of my room. They loved running to tell me it was snowing last night while daddy was putting up outside Christmas decorations. David is doing well for the moment with housework and keeping up with everything. Ben has been a tremendous help and I try to do what little I can, when I can (wipe a countertop as I pass by, sprinkle the carpet freshening powder as a I hobble back to my room, take stickers off the wall that the kids have gotten into :) etc). Everything else just has to be "let go".

I do appreciate the prayers and support and ask that you continue. We've had friends make and freeze (with directions), some meals, to help relieve David out with care of family and responsibilities. The food we have recieved so far has been a blessing and a great help and so delicious! I can not Thank everyone enough!!!!! I really appreciate each and every one of you. Thank you! I will update again if and when there is something to report...probably Wednesday. David has the next two weeks off to take care of me/kids, take kids and I to Dr. appts. ect.

I also posted pictures of "setting up Christmas", I pretty much laid on the couch and took pictures and watched the kids. Shanndon had been BEGGING to put up Christmas, as he saw lights and such around town. I personally don't believe in skipping over Thanksgiving though, so we waited til the weekend after Thanksgiving. The kids had a blast.

Surgery Details

Thursday Nov. 20-My check in time was 830am. I signed in at 8:34am, the Center actually called me to see if I was still coming in (as I was pulling up to the door!). They were all rush rush, as if I had been 15 minutes late or something. Geesh...
Only one person could go back with me, so immediately after signing in, I had to say goodbye to David and the kids. I walked in with nothing but PJs on and my glasses, so they had nothing to misplace. When David has his shoulder surgery, it took them an hour to locate his glasses!!!!!!!!!!!! I am blind, I couldn't have that!
Surgery was scheduled for 930am. I did not get back there til noon!!!!!!! Talk about mental anguish. The anticipation and stark cold waiting area was so mentally depleting and torture. They couldn't give me a sedative or anything like they normally do while"waiting" because I had to stand up to have the DR "mark" me! So he knew what he was doing in surgery.
I finally got taken back about noon and into recovery about 6pm and to my room about 8pm. The kids were with my friend, Lea, and David was at work. The DR. personally called David to tell him about the surgery. Everything went very well, he was very pleased. For the first night, I was hooked up to a catheter and IV meds...Morphine-NICE!
Friday at 6am the Dr. came in and said that I could be discharged if I wanted or I could choose to stay another night. They'd have to take me off the IV and get me up and walking pretty quick. I had prepaid for a 2nd night (on the nurse's advise "just in case" cause it's cheaper if you prepay, so I told him that and he was relieved...they didn't have to rush me. Turns out they didn't have the oral pain medicine there-Dilaudid. So the DR. wrote a script and David had to go to Walgreens to fill it and bring it to the Center (my friend Jennie watched the kids so David could do that). I was taken off the catheter and was up a few times on Friday. They started the Dilaudid about 6pm and took me off the Morphine about 11pm. Saturday, I took a shower at the center and David came and got me. We got home probably about 130pm if I remember correctly (not sure). Again, Jennie watched the kids for him to come get me and we picked them up on the way home. I came home and took my place in bed...my new home! LOL.
For being day two, things aren't too bad. I'm pretty drugged and not in much pain. Things went better then I thought. I have 4 drains sticking out of me. They are tubes that empty into a bulb and we have to empty them every 8 hours and measure thier contents, as well as pull on the plastic tubing (strip them) to prevent any clotting and keep good suction. Since they are on the side of me...one in each hip and one in each upper thigh, David has this task. The boys are handling being around me well, slow, gentle...Christianna, not so much...she's being kept away from me...she's been "too rough".
David is on day shift Mon-Wed. Stephanie will come over about 9am Monday and get the kids and she'll watch the kids Monday and Tuesday. Tuesday night the kids will sleep over at Diana's. David will have off Thanksgiving, Friday and the weekend, then his leave will start.
I go to the DR. Wednesday-stay tuned for updates.

Preparing for surgery

I've been "preparing" for surgery for months. This was one of the reasons for stopping the daycare and renting out the house. I had one month to get the house settled before surgery. How do you prepare to be sliced in a circle and sewn back together? David and I have been talking a lot about the possible complications-let's be frank here-death. Most likely David would just toss everything and live in filth! LOL. I needed to get things functionable here, organized and easily accessible. I NEVER do things to satifaction, but I've had to learn to "let go" and relax a LOT on my standards. Much to my amazement, the night before surgery, I was tired!!!! So I went to bed at a decent hour. USUALLY, I would be on "crunch time mode" and stay up all night doing things that needed to be finished!
So that David doesn't have to use leave, we have babysitting set up for the day of surgery and the day after, then the 3 days before Thanksgiving. The kids are so looking forward to that. Who wouldn't want hours with friends, for 5 days?! LOL Then David will take the first two weeks of Dec. off.
I'm not "satisfied", but I'm "okay" with what I've gotten done. I have organized give away/garage sale stuff, business stuff, office stuff, storage stuff, scrapbooking stuff and school/art stuff. They aren't set up really, but they are sorted and in "areas". The basement playroom and guest room are completely set up and currently to my satisfaction and the entire upstairs is set up and cleaned to satisfaction. Those were the important areas. OH YA, and David had most of the garage sorted and organized! We got bracket shelving and utility shelving for it...nice!!!!! Still can't really walk thru the garage, but that's only because bikes and scooters and wagons are strewn all over...not due to clutter or mess. It's so nice to have everything simplified and organized! Still have a long way to go...I DREAD the scrap area!!!! But, I'll get there!
Wow...my mom would be so proud of me right this second...she's always asking me..."are you content yet?" I think I may have a feeling of some contentment at the moment. A sense of mental peace?! Wierd! Does this mean I'm gonna die on the table, now that I have a sense of contentment? LMAO. Just kidding. Would be ironic though wouldn't it? Now you're content-time to die!
Keep us in your prayers and thoughts. Here we go...stay tuned for updates-

Homocidal Rampage

When we first started marriage counseling, we filled out a "FOCUS" questionaire. It is a 91 mutliple choice question survey that each partner seperately fills out about how they feel about specific things in the relationship. For instance, "You and your spouse have the same thoughts on sex. strongly agree, agree, sometimes, disagree, strongly disagree", etc. Then it was sent off to be analyzed and we proceeded to go over it the last few months. The FOCUS pulled out our strengths and weaknesses in our relationship and we've been working on those things in counseling and at home, etc. Our marriage counselor asked us to get a babysitter for our next session, so we can fill out a "FOCUS for the future" thingy. This questionaire is more like... "knowing what you do about this issue, how will you try to connect with your spouse and make things better?" This was not the multiple choice that the other FOCUS was, this required introspection, thought and explanation about what your plans are to help the relationship. I am a very open person and have no trouble most times saying how I feel, what my plans are and how I plan to achieve my goals. David, however, is not. This was very dissapointing. Half the thing he didn't fill out. The other half was generic crap, in my opinion. No thoughts, no feelings, no emotions. This has been the problem in our marriage, but he's been supposedly working on this for the last few months. It was just like this was an eye opener that he really wasn't trying. It's also stuff that's been surfacing again the last few days. Then he proceeds to tell me he felt bombarded and didn't understand why I would feel sad over his answers. He tells me he feels like a zombie and has no feelings, thoughts or opinions about anything. That's suppose to make me feel loving and happy?
So we ended up having a long session, ran to pick up kids from the babysitter, and David hurried to get ready for work. I was sad and upset. While David is getting ready for work, he proceeds to tell me that he went to the orderly room yesterday to find out what he needs to test for his next rank in February and make sure he has everything in order to do so (which I told him to do in January!!!!) and found out that he can't!!!!!!!! He can NOT test til Feb. 2010!!! Now I'm livid. When he got demoted and his stripe taken, last December, I told him he'd have to be in a certain amount of time, he assured me that he checked into it and all was well, he'd just miss one testing cycle, blah blah blah. HE LIED!!!!!!!! I went off! Homocidal rampage. I really feel like I want to kill him at this point! More time in this financial ditch we're in! Does he care? NO! Does he have any thoughts, or opionions about it? NO! I wanted to kill him. I hate him for putting our family in this situation! I hate him for not caring! I hate him for just "being". How can you "just be"? How can you not think about what's next? Recourse to your actions? How can you have no feelings or thoughts for your wife and children? I asked him, if I died in the surgery, or me and the children left him, if he'd care and he said that sometimes he didn't think so. WHAT? At least it was honest.
So I'm livid, screaming my head off at him over the phone (cause he had to go to work!), cleaning like mad, and I needed to calm down. I couldn't find my Xanax, so I took my son's Ativan. I guess there aren't exactly the same, or equal in miligrams (I only took 2.5 mg), etc...cause I got very tired and took a nap with the kids and didn't wake up. Stephanie called at 330pm and Ben answered, saying I was sleeping (not unusual, I often take naps with the kids). So then I was suppose to be at church at 6pm and when Steph called back at 630pm, I was still sleeping...so she freaked out and told Ben to wake me up. I called her back, she called Jennie to check on me, I was very groggy, yada yada. Hey, at least I stopped my homcidal rampage!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I have come to the conclusion that David's not going to change for any length of time, let alone permanently. I need to just deal with it and adapt. I have 4 kids. That's it. I either have to come to grips with it, or be in eternal and perpetual misery!

Friends

I have been burned bad, over the years by "friends". While I am a very open person and most people know everything about me, I am still not trusting. I expect the bad. My mom has had her friends over while I've been visiting and they are laughing and having a great time. She'll look over at me and say, "see this is why you need friends." Friends schmends...so they can tell people your personal business, talk bad about you, stab you in the back? No thanks.
I try to be a good person, not be judgemental and opinionated. I try to help anyone and everyone in anyway I possibly can, even if I've been burned by that person, I still help if I can. I have let my family suffer to help friends, I have bent over backwards to help people in general, you don't even have to be a friend, if I can, I will help. For what? Usually I lose the friend, or they drop me when I'm no longer needed, they talk bad behind my back...I've given up. I still help people and try to be a good friend (it's ingrained in me and the way I was raised!!!), but my expectations for reciprication are very low. I'm an odd duck (if you're reading this, it means your on my friends list and most likely know this about me already)...I expect disagreement and judgement and bad talk about my life. It's just how it's always ended up.
The last few years I have surrounded myself with "different" people. Most my friends are local homeschoolers. I am not a greatly social person, so I don't meet many that are outside our online local homeschooling group and I'm not good with the phone and visiting and all that. So this has been nice, you chat online and meet for playdates, occasional field trip...nothing to serious, not too much "face to face", no worries about phone communication, etc. Since I've had the gastric bypass and then immediately following-the two younger children, I've felt like I was drowning in life. I've been "getting by". I do the once a month meet with friends "socially", but other then that, it's a weekly or every other week playgroup meeting. I haven't gotten too close to many people.
This small group of local homeschoolers has really become good friends! I have been proven wrong. Okay so everyone still has thier opinons, but they tell them to you and share them with you and straight up about who they are. Everyone talks about everyone, but that's just life! LOL. This group I have fallen in love with has really been such a blessing!!!! They are seemingly understanding, loving, accepting. Some of them I don't see often, but they are there in spirit and kindness and words of encouragement and love.
My friend Stephanie has put together a care taking schedule for the kids and help round the house, and meals for while I am in surgery and recovering! Much to my suprise!!!! Stephanie said, "there are lots of people that love you Jenn and want to help." WHY? This surgery I am having is elective, I thought if anything, I'd be judged and "dropped" like a bad habit. No, instead, people are helping me!!! They are offering and insisting on taking care of kids and to come over and help me. Here I am in my most cynical, skeptical, reclusive, and depressed stage of life and people are rallying around to help me???? I can't offer to babysit or cook in return (although I can clean and organize pretty well)...what can I do to repay them?
My friends: Stephanie, (Ashley when she was here!!!), Jennie, Lea, Rachel, and Diana have had and will have the kids more then I've ever LET anyone. They've really made it feel safe to allow them to help me and not feel like a failure! Stephanie, Lea and Jennie have made me feel safe to "let go" a bit. I'm sure there's the whole gossiping thing, but I don't care! They don't make me feel like an alien. Stephanie and Lea have more kids then me and they are okay! They've survived this stage of life. I can only hope that it was with the help of great friends like I have had to get me through. I can only hope that they were shown the comradre, positivity and acceptance that they've passed on to me. I have been truly blessed. Thank you God for sending such wonderful people into my life at a most critical time.
Thank you to my dear friends. I appreciate you!!! Thank you for the love, kindness, encouragement, and physical and emotional help you have given me and my family.