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August 09, 2004

Day One and Two

I was asleep.

I can only tell you what they told me.

The surgery went well. They found no involvement of my bowels or kidneys or bladder with the tumors (sometimes they can fuse together and teasing them apart during the operation can injure them and cause bleeding and later scarring).

The tumors were surprisingly large and curious enough that the doctors were intrigued by the strange protrusions. I guess the mine were intermural tumors, which are embedded in the muscle wall of the uterus - but they just kept growing and pushing all the boundaries of my uterus in different directions. And some of those tumors had other growing on top of them so it was just a huge bumpy mess.

At the end of the operation, after I was sewed up and they were going to wheel me out to recovery, they woke me up. I remember seeing a clear/white plastic rectangular bin and at the bottom were two large masses. They were light pink with darker red patches too them, actually, much lighter than I expected, like a tongue or gums or something. They looked hard and dense. The smaller one was irregular and about the size of a baseball and the large thing was long and about as big around as the first and kind of twisted at the bottom of the bucket.

Of course I didn't know what this was. I was in recovery and asked the recovery nurse if they had actually showed that to me or if I dreamed it and she confirmed it all.

The weirdest part is the thought that all this crap was inside me. An eggplant and a baseball and a bunch of other little bumps and protrusions off of those. That's a huge mass! And to be so asymptomatic! Just some pressure, but no real pain. But I know that they were continuing to grow and if I left them there, they surely would have caused some serious trouble.

Posted by Elizabeth M. at 11:58 AM | Comments (1)

The Pre-Op Tale

I'm home from the hospital. The surgery went flawlessly.

It turns out that the fibroids were much bigger than the ultrasound indicated.

The largest was the size of an eggplant (sitting sideways across the backside of my uterus). It was eight inches long and four inches around. There were another dozen or so, just protruding in all directions from my uterus as well. The doctor said that if she were to perform the myomectomy, she would probably not have been able to preserve enough uterine tissue to perserve my fertility and she would have to leave too many of the smaller tumors which likely would have grown back.

The best news is that my ovaries and tubes were in great shape, and there were no infiltrations of the tumors on my cervix and that was left as well.

I'll post more later. For the most part I feel much like I did after doing a marathon - my abs are just plain old sore like I'd done a huge workout and I'm tired, tired, tired.

Posted by Elizabeth M. at 10:00 AM | Comments (3)

August 08, 2004

Confidence for the First Time

I'm home from the hospital. The surgery went flawlessly.

It turns out that the fibroids were much bigger than the ultrasound indicated.

The largest was the size of an eggplant (sitting sideways across the backside of my uterus). It was eight inches long and four inches around. There were another dozen or so, just protruding in all directions from my uterus as well. The doctor said that if she were to perform the myomectomy, she would probably not have been able to preserve enough uterine tissue to perserve my fertility and she would have to leave too many of the smaller tumors which likely would have grown back.

The best news is that my ovaries and tubes were in great shape, and there were no infiltrations of the tumors on my cervix and that was left as well.

I'll post more later. For the most part I feel much like I did after doing a marathon - my abs are just plain old sore like I'd done a huge workout and I'm tired, tired, tired.

Posted by Elizabeth M. at 11:21 AM | Comments (0)

August 05, 2004

Away

I'm off to the hospital in a half an hour.

I slept pretty well, I woke up a lot, went to the bathroom twice. Boy will I be glad when it's just mental problems that keep me up all night!

I've been fasting, which includes no water. I really drink a lot of water, so not having any since 11 last night is a huge thing for me. I have a little squick of a headache, but I think that's either not sleeping enough or dehydration.

I did a little pre-admission interview over the phone yesterday. I asked if I was getting a private room, the nurse said, "Honey, that's all we have is private rooms." Whee! They'll even set up a cot in my room if the hubby wants to stay with me the first night. I can't imagine why he'd need to. I'll be sleeping.

I should be back home and online by Sunday.

Posted by Elizabeth M. at 07:54 AM | Comments (0)