Surgery

Hoping to emulate Cecil and Rose's "water off a ducks back" attitude.

I have a friend who, before she hops on a flight, tells us to please make sure we will love her children should the plane not reach its destination and her children are hence left motherless. I, of course tell her she's being ridiculous, the odds are extremely low anything will happen, you're more likely to be hit by a bus on the way to work, yadda yadda yadda, please have fun in Fiji and we'll see her and her new sun tan in a week.

The night before her flight she usually tortures herself by watching re-runs of Air Crash Investigation, in an attempt to memorise every scenario that may go wrong so that she is in a position to knock on the cockpit door and offer assistance if things get hairy. I'm sure she has a perfectly rational reason for this irrational behaviour.

Which brings me to my own irrational fear that I've just discovered this week. It's related to surgery, something I've never had before. Although it takes quite a lot to rattle me, it seems I'm a big fat scaredy cat at the prospect of being put to sleep. I have a perfectly rational explanation for my fear and it stems from my Law degree and more specifically, that year I spent studying "Law & Medicine" in which you only focus on the surgeries that do go wrong. You see, us humans are not robots and there's this thing called human error which happens to the best of us. I just feel that the stakes are high with human error in the case of surgery and whether the surgeon has a good night sleep before my surgery is something I have absolutely no control over. Trust issues anyone?

I'm having surgery tomorrow. Even the word surgery sounds a bit ominous don't you think so I better tell you in advance that that I'm not booked in for anything serious like triple bypass heart surgery or a lung transplant.

But I am having an organ removed. Now that sounds a bit serious too so I should tell you it's not a vital organ or anything. Apparently it's quite useless. Not as useless as the Appendix mind you. No, I wouldn't be getting my knickers in a twist over a silly little thing like that. It's slightly more important than that.

It's just routine surgery though, if cutting you open, inserting tiny movie cameras and fiddling around with your insides is considered 'routine'. I wouldn't say that sort of thing is part of my daily routine but I'm in no position to argue - the organ has to come out right now.

The Doctor said I had to wait until 6 weeks post birth before I could have surgery and that way breastfeeding would be well and truly established. Of course I ask if that's to make sure the baby has had the best possible start in life should anything happen to me in surgery. He looked at me as if I had already lost my mind and said something about the risk of blood clots diminishing after 6 weeks following pregnancy and birth. Oh, that's a relief! Not! So of course I wait until 4 months post-birth to have the surgery - give myself a few extra weeks leeway to make sure that blood clotting risk is well and truly behind us.

So not as serious as an Appendectomy, but serious enough that you have still have to 'sign your life away'. You know, the one where you sign a document too hard to see let alone read that says you understand all the risks of the surgery and are happy to continue and that you won't sue the doctor should there be a little mishap. At this point the Doctor starts chatting away about the 'odds'. Apparently the "odds" are good and very very unlikely anything bad will happen. Well, it's also very unlikely that an egg will split in half to give you two children for the price of one too isn't it? My perspective on 'odds' is a little different these days as well.

On the plus side, I have been busying myself with Miss Maggie Rabbit in the evenings instead of letting my "Googlechondria" add to my already anxious state. Miss Maggie is finished and I can't wait to show you. Also on a positive, I have heard I will feel like I've had the best sleep ever after I come out of surgery and this is a very welcome thing after 4 months of broken newborn sleep.

So I guess what I'm trying to say is that Flynn and I will be in hospital for 2 days and it may be a little quiet over here for a few days while I recover.

Anyone else need a lobotomy on the way to their simple, 30 minute "routine" procedure?

Mel x


PS. My routine procedure is a Gallbladder removal.