From the Heart- 2nd Vascular Surgery This Month + Next Step

Hi everyone!  Hooray, it's Saturday 🎉😊!  I apologize for posting late.  This week was a pretty busy week for me, namely because I had another vascular surgery.  In today's blog post, I'm going to share some of the deets of that with you and also talk about what's the next step in my healthcare.

So, for some context, you can see my most recent medical post.  To sum that post up, my vascular surgeon said that he wanted to try one more time to get more blood flow in my right leg.  He wanted to do another surgery somewhat soon after the one I had at the beginning of March.  This is because he wanted to ensure that the vein didn't close back up like it had after the first surgery.  I realize that at this point, you might be confused about what surgery happened when and all that.  So, I had my first vascular surgery last summer, my second one at the beginning of this month, and my third (and hopefully the last one for a while) this past week.

I'm not going to tell all of the details from this vascular surgery; I told you guys a lot of those just a couple of weeks ago so y'all know the drill 😉.  In this post, I'll just tell you the notable things that happened this 3rd time around.

First thing-  you'd think that by now I'd be a pro at dealing with getting an IV.  Apparently, I'm not 😬.  The 2nd time I had vascular surgery, the nurse numbed the part of my hand where she was going to insert the IV with lidocaine.  On a scale of 1-10 of pain, getting the lidocaine and the IV was like a 2-  it hurt a little, but not that bad.  For some reason this past week when the time came to get an IV, I thought that the nurse didn't need to numb me with lidocaine before inserting the IV; I thought that getting the IV without the lidocaine would be just like getting a little shot.  So when the nurse asked if I wanted lidocaine before getting the IV, I said no.  Boy, was that a stupid move on my part 🙈.  Getting an IV without lidocaine feels like getting 5 shots at once in the same place in slow motion if you know what I mean 😣.  Bottom line:  lidocaine is your friend when you get an IV!

Another thing that was different with this 3rd surgery was that I had it around 1:45 in the afternoon, so I didn't have to be at the hospital until 11 in the morning!  While it was nice to get to sleep normal hours the night before the surgery, I wasn't allowed to eat anything after midnight, so I definitely had low blood sugar by the time the surgery rolled around.  I honestly didn't feel that bad, but my vision was kind of blurry from lack of food 😵.  When I told some of the medical staff, they weren't too concerned as I think that is a side effect of not eating for a long time.

The other thing that I requested be done differently with this vascular surgery was not getting versed before going into the cath lab (the place where the vascular surgery is done).  This is because the versed made me feel weird last time and also made me forget some of the moments before surgery.  The combination of not feeling good and lack of control over my mind made me decide to opt out of getting versed before this past week's surgery.  I think this was a good decision, but I definitely noticed that I was significantly more nervous in the cath lab this time around because I was fully aware of what was going on.  I guess that when I was being wheeled to the cath lab, it hit me that this surgery was really happening and I started wondering if I was going to be ok after the surgery.  Any of you who have had surgery know what I mean- right before, you start wondering if you'll make it out ok.  (By the way, general anesthesia is very safe, so it's not like I was entering a dangerous situation 😉.)  Once in the cath lab, my nervousness was very apparent.  My heart was pounding (it got up to around 130 beats per minute, which is what it normally is when I exercise).  I saw my heart rate on the monitor and, feeling bad for getting so anxious, said something to the people in the room like, "I'm sorry, I'm just a little nervous."  (That was an understatement.)  Then something happened that I'll never forget.  One of the medical staff in the room could tell that I was getting stressed out and he asked me what kind of music I like to listen to.  I replied that I like Christian music.  He then pulled out his phone and hit play on the playlist that he said his son listens to every night.  He put the phone right by my ear so I could hear it and the song that started playing was "I Can Only Imagine".  I think that God used that small but incredibly touching action of that man to help calm me down 💗.  (This was the same man who was joking with me last time that I was trying to figure out what was going on right before the surgery 😂.)  Probably about a minute after that, and I was out 💤!

Next thing I knew, I think I was in the PACU (post-anesthesia recovery unit).  I think that since I didn't get versed before the surgery, that contributed to the fact that I wasn't as groggy waking up from surgery (though I think I did ask my parents the same or similar questions more than once 😂.)

Since I didn't wake up from surgery until about 5 in the evening and subsequently had to lie flat for 6 hours afterward and be on an IV blood thinner all night, I spent the night at the hospital.  Even though I didn't sleep much that night (hello loud IV drips and alarms going off), God gave me the grace to get through the night by reminding me of a lot of Christian songs that I know.

The next morning, I got an x-ray and ultrasound done I think to make sure that I didn't have any blood clots and to see the stent.  Oh!  I should probably tell you guys how the surgery actually went.  Praise God, it went well 🙌😊!!  Apparently, the surgeon was a lot happier about how this 3rd surgery went than he was last time.  Although my vein had closed up again since the last surgery, the surgeon was able to insert the catheter into the occluded vein through another way and was able to get more blood flowing in my right leg!  He inserted another stent into my upper leg to do this.  Funny story-  to see if there was flow in my leg, the surgeon put an IV in my foot and sent contrast through it to see how it flowed 😂.  I think that that was probably the first time that I've ever had an IV put into my foot.  It was funny because my foot was orange after the surgery because of the sterilizing agent that was put on it during the surgery so that it was all clean for the IV 😁.  It kind of looked like I had gotten shot in the foot with an orange paintball.

A couple of hours or so after getting the ultrasound done, I got released to go home!

In terms of what's next in dealing with my circulation, there's nothing huge.  I think my vascular surgeon will keep following my case and I have a follow-up appointment with him in a few weeks, I think.

That's all for now.  Don't forget to follow me on Instagram!  I look forward to posting again on Monday 😊.  (hopefully the smoothie of the month for April 😋!)

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