In yesterday's post, I described how I discovered I had a hernia and went about scheduling a surgery. I'd never had any kind of surgery before in my life. I hadn't even been in a hospital as a patient since I was born.
The first thing I had to take care of was cleaning up the apartment for Mom and Dend when they came up. Even though I knew about this for a few days, I decided to procrastinate until they called me from Yuma to let me know they were close. That meant I had three hours to clean stuff up. As it turned out, I came nowhere close to calculating the correct amount of time it would take for me to clean the place.
I also realized that I still needed to buy some new underwear for after the surgery. I needed a larger size because I knew I was going to have to keep ice on the incision area. I was able to enlist the help of Thoz, who was kind enough to run to Kmart to buy some briefs for me. (This was perhaps the only time in my adult life before I was married that I had a woman buy my underwear.)
Mom and Dend arrived and the apartment was still a mess. Mom complained about it, and she was right to do so. She helped to complete the cleaning. I felt really bad about that.
Because they came a couple of days before the surgery was scheduled, we decided to go to Disneyland. I was able to arrange with Chud to let us in for free. He was actually going to be there because his mom was in town to visit him. This was interesting because this was the first time since our recital in college 12 years earlier that I had seen his mother.
Mom, Dend and I had a good time at Disneyland. It was good to get out of the house and do something because we weren't going to get to do much of that while I was recovering. But nothing really eventful happened while we were there.
The next day was the surgery. Dr. A told me the procedure would take about an hour and I would be conscious. However, Mom said that while that was true, I probably wouldn't be aware of what was going on. I didn't know what to expect.
We arrived at the outpatient clinic. After going in the back and changing my clothes, I was taken into the operating room. The staff started administering the IV. After a few minutes, I heard a female medical assistant ask, "Should I shave the area?" I then heard her ask that again. And that was the last thing I remembered...
I woke up a little later. I could see the surgeon was working on me. I thought to myself, "Well, this is going to be one REALLY long hour." The anesthesiologist looked at me and asked, "Are you awake?" I nodded my head. "Okay, the doctor's just finishing up. You'll be out of here in a little bit." I thought, "Wow, did a whole hour just disappear from my life?"
After Dr. A was finished and the staff was wheeling me out, he said, "Oh, and I'm sorry about what happened to your penis!" I was still loopy from the drugs, but I probably figured he was kidding. "Oh, that's alright!" I guess he gets a kick out of doing that to the patients when they're still under the influence.
I got taken to recovery. I was given a cup of orange juice. I drank it and I fell back asleep. When I woke up, I was still holding the empty cup in my hand.
While I was in recovery, Dr. A came out to talk to Mom and Dend. However, Mom had been on pins and needles worrying about me and really needed to go to the bathroom. She held out as long as possible, but it got to the point she could no longer wait. That was when the doctor came out. He talked to Dend. He told him the surgery was a success and I was doing well. I talked throughout the procedure. (Really? What the heck was I talking about?) He also said I had a large hernia, about six or seven inches. But I would be fine now. Mom completely missed the doctor.
Mom and Dend drove me home. Then the real recovery began. More on that tomorrow.
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