Pre-Op Consultation

September 15, 2009

Okay, first I just have to tell you….today Nicole, my amazing web designer showed the model for what this blog is going to look like and it. is. AWESOME! I’m so excited for you to see it but with surgery next week and preparing a special online communion for my other blog for this weekend, it might have to wait until post-surgery. I hope not but if so, it’s worth the wait.

I. So. Excited.

Today was my pre-op consultation which means another appointment of having my body parts pulled, stretched, poked, examined  and photographed. Did I mention these are the body parts that have rarely seen the light of day? Were it not for the fact that the doctor is so respectful and his female assistant such a crack-up, what could be an otherwise embarrassing experience could actually qualify as fun. Fun not only because of the jokes flying back and forth (I tend to rely heavily on humor when attempting to hide my naked body behind a 2×3 foot scrap of fabric) but because all three of us were so excited talking about what the final results of the surgery will be. As I’ve already told you, in more detail than you ever wanted to know, excess sagging skin will be removed from my inner thighs along with some minor liposuction below the knees to keep my legs in overall proportion. The incision on the leg will continue up and behind my “chair cheeks” so that excess skin can be removed and what remains lifted, including the buttocks (there, I said it) and the outer thighs. As we travel upward past my gorgeous new belly button, the “little girls” will also be lifted and the upper arm flaps (that could nearly make me airborne on a windyday) will be removed. During this surgery the doctor will also remove via liposuction a round pocket of fat (about the size of half a baseball) that’s settled on my stomach where the previous surgery was done.  The doctor explained that when they remove fat from an area of the body they leave just enough so that the body’s system continues to function normally but now that my stomach has healed and everything has adapted to the changes the remaining fat can be removed.  Bye-bye belly bubble!

Along with going over all the details of the surgery I raised an issue of concern for me with Dr. Lavey that had occurred during the last surgery, and that was the use of Versed. Versed is a medication that’s used for pre-op sedation prior to the administering of the general anesthetics. The main purpose for even using it is to help calm people’s anxiety in those last few minutes before surgery. The problem, at least for me, with Versed is that it’s an amnesia drug and so from the time it was given to me in the pre-op area (roughly 15-20 minutes prior to surgery) I don’t remember anything. I was awake and talking. I waved goodbye to D as they rolled me to the OR. I responded to the doctor’s questions and when instructed to do so slid from the transport table to the operating table. But I have no memory of any of it. Blank slate. And that bothered me. Alot. The reason why is simple. I’m excited about surgery, not afraid. I’ve waited much of my life to have a body that falls within the normal range and I want to remember as much of what’s going on as possible. Now, don’t get me wrong. I want to totally be in LaLaLand during surgery. I have no interest at all in watching or feeling them cut and paste and nip and tuck me. But I want to pray with D prior to surgery and remember praying. I want to remember kissing her goodbye and telling her I love her and hearing she loves me. I want to remember going into the OR and spending an alert minute or two with the five or six people who are going to spend the entire day using their gifts to make a dream of mine come true. I want to remember telling them thank you.

So that’s what I told Dr. Lavey and he said with a smile “Then no Versed for you.” I can’t tell you how happy I am about that. It also means I’ll have more alert time in the following hours I spend in recovery at the hospital, as alert as a person can be after eight hours of general anesthesia and regular shots of elephant numbing pain medication that is. But still, I’ll remember the stuff that’s important to me and if I remember a little more of the pain immediately after the surgery, that seems worth the price to me.

Posted in Reconstructive Surgery