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Living my best life

Leading up to my surgery, I had some of the worst dreams that I didn’t want to share until it was over. Every day, I thought something was going to prevent me from having this surgery done. I had this sick feeling deep in my stomach that something would go wrong.
And when nothing happened in the days leading me to surgery, I thought for sure something was going to happen in the OR. Last Sunday night, at the hotel in Albany, I don’t think I slept more than 20 minutes. I got up before my alarm, took a hot bath and prepared myself for this. I felt this feeling of excitement that the day was finally here but also a feeling of panic. 
I met with my surgeon and two other surgeons helping her, a few nurses, and 2 or 3 anesthesiologists. Each one had different information that I tried to absorb but thinking back now I don’t think I understood a single thing any of them said. They finally were ready to bring me into the OR and I couldn’t have anything to relax me because it may interfere with testing out the equipment in the OR. It was the most awake I had ever been going into surgery and I was starting to panic. They propped me up on a bunch of pillows and the neurologist looked at me, with hair clippers in his hand and said “all your hair is coming off right?” As he started to buzz my head. I looked at the anesthesiologist with tears in my eyes and drifted into sedation. From then on, I was in and out of consciousness. I remember crying in pain almost the whole time and they kept telling me to open my eyes and follow their fingers. I felt like I couldn’t open my eyes. I remember them telling me to repeat “it’s a sunny day in Albany” over and over again and I just kept crying that my neck hurt. Every time I said my neck hurt they told me they would give me medicine. And what seemed like days later, I woke up in the recovery room asking to see my family. I remember waking up and looking at Jim and saying “well... I woke up”. I was so happy to see his face and my parents faces. I made it through, nothing bad happened. The next few hours are a blur, I think I slept a lot and ended up getting sick. 
Later that night, I had to have a ct scan and then was moved into a room with several other patients separated by curtains so we could be watched closely. I thought I felt good and sat up and ate salad, which ended up being a bad choice and I ended up getting sick 3-4 times over the next several hours. My nurse was pretty awesome though and was telling everyone how amazing I was, so that made me feel good!
Mid afternoon on Tuesday, I was all set to go home. Thankfully, Jim was by my side every step of the way and brought me home to get my fried chicken I always crave! Wednesday he stayed home from work to take care of me and help me bring the kids to and from school. It was so nice to see the kids smiling faces! They always know how to brighten my day!
Thursday morning we were up early to drive back to Albany for part 2. I was asleep for this part so I don’t remember much. I do remember waking up crying in a lot of pain. It’s mostly a blur but they let Jim come see me and I was in pretty bad shape. They ended up letting me sleep for s couple hours and I woke up in much better shape. They moved me to a different room for a little while then we were on our way home. And of course Jim stopped for my fried chicken again! 

It was a rough week but I am so incredibly thankful for Jim and for my parents for going with me and taking care of me this whole week. I’m also incredibly lucky to have so many wonderful people in my life who have called to check in, send me cards and flowers and help me with the kids. The next step is to have this thing turned on in a couple weeks and I am so ready to get on to living my best life possible and having the most wonderful pain free year. ❤️

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