~What Happens In the OR.....~

It's so easy to just 'mush' your way through life.....day-to-day, rolling along on your own 'schedule', whether it be a day of work or play....weekday or weekend day.....day you're looking forward to.....or not.  Before you know it, it's another week, month, year later. And the older you get, the faster it flies.

Life was going along just that way for me. Life without Mom was getting a bit easier as the days went by. Until Wednesday. An unexpected surgery threw me right into, "I need my Mom" mode. Just that quickly.

To backtrack a bit...the winter-before last, during a bout with pneumonia that my lungs just wouldn't let go of, my dr. sent me for a chest x-ray. Plain ol' chest x-ray. Nothing unusual. Just to see what was going on. Well....he called to say he had good news and bad news: the good: my lungs were fine; the bad: they saw "something" near my pancreas or spleen.  So....more tests. Conclusion: I had a splenic artery aneurysm.  Many ultrasounds and CAT scans later.....the vascular surgeon "thought" is was totally encapsulated with no blood flow. A good thing, as when these rupture, death is the result. FYI: there are no telling symptoms like there are with brain or heart aneurysms. So......he would check it again. And guess what: he thought he detected bloodflow this time.

I went in Wed. for an "embolization" of the aneurysm. Terrified. Reassured that I'd be totally asleep. Well....they lied. I was WIDE awake. Granted, I was in no pain....but waiting the entire time for the "good stuff" that would put me out. It didn't come!! Seems they needed me to hold my breath at times. Hmmm.
At one point, I said I was bored....and asked if it was okay if I sang a few songs! Anyone who knows me knows that that is NOT something I would normally volunteer to do. But sang I did: nursery rhymes and church hymns.  Afterward I was feeling uncomfortably embarrassed, when a sweet nurse whispered in my ear, "Honey...what happens in the OR, STAYS in the OR"!!

Outcome: the aneurysm was totally encapsulated, so no embolization was needed. Seems my body had already 'rerouted' the blood through a new path into the artery. I cannot tell you how relieved I was when the surgeon told me. I immediately clasped my hands and started saying prayers of thanksgiving...right there in the OR.

Wheeled back into recovery to lay flat for the next 4 hours....I thought to myself: As soon as I can sit up I need to call Mom. She'll be worried. And then I remembered where she was. And that she already knew.

So now, 5 days of doing nothin'....reading books.....cuddling with Rosie....and saying MANY prayers of thanksgiving for talented surgeons, diagnostic machines....and chest x-rays!!  Count your blessings!