Tonight's class

Tonight I had a pre-op and nutrition class. I found the pre-op one pretty informative, but the nut was mostly review or things I had learned on my own. Dan was unable to come so I made sure to take good notes. They also gave us print outs of the PowerPoint presentation.

On my way there I stopped by Max Muscle. I am glad I did! I got 1 canister of protein powder (100% Whey vanilla ice cream flavor) and 2 OhYeah! RTDs (cookies & creme and vanilla). The guy there was the owner and super nice and helpful. He used to play football at Ole' Miss and seemed to know his stuff about the products. We had a convo about the protein bullets and he even said that putting 42g of protein in it is useless because your body can't absorb that much it's more of a marketing thing because some body builders think it's great. I really liked that he was totally honest about that kind of thing and not tried to build it up just to sell product.

On to the class stuff, here are some notes of importance

*After surgery I will have a JP drain in. This may be out when I leave the hospital, it might come home with me.
*Afterwards I will never be able to have asprin. They gave us a card tonight to keep in our wallets. Also highly recommended a medic alert bracelet and Lauren's Hope. The support group I attend weekly online actually gives away 1 $80 gift cert to there every week, so I'm hoping to win one! Or I might order some beads and have my friend Kim make me one.
*I will need to be at the hospital about 2 hours prior to surgery. Which means we'll need to head out of here at 5am, yikes!
*The operation should take anywhere from 1-3hrs. Every 45min-1hr someone will come out of the OR and give Dan an update on how I am and the progress.
*No one will be allowed in the recovery room. I should be in there anywhere from 1-3hrs.
*After getting settled in my room people will be allowed up within an hour.
*Something I found really neat was instead of a call button going to a general nurses station, each nurse carries their own phone. The number will be listed on the board in my room so I can call her/him directly instead of a nurses station.
*All of the rooms are private. I did not see one, but have heard they are pretty nice.
*Morning after surgery I will have an Upper GI test. This will test for "leaks" in my new pouch.
*I will start with narcotic IV pain meds and a PCA pump.
*I'll get either liquid Lortab or liquid Dilaudid for pain at home.
*Typical stay is 2-3 nights. So I'll probably be set free on Thurs or Fri.
*While I'm on pain meds I can't drive. For some people that's a few days, some it is a few weeks.
*I mentioned that I recovered very quickly from my c-sections, esp the 2nd one, and the nurse said this should be pretty easy then. Yay!
*Usually the day of surgery I'll be allowed ice chips. A 40cc cup should last me 4 hours though...yikes!

I have a lot more of notes, but a lot of it is just little reminders for myself (like to ask Dr Friedman the size of my pouch and length of bypass after surgery because it varies by patient).

At the group tonight were 3 other patients. 1 is having surgery tomorrow, 1 on Monday, and the other will be after me on Tues.

It's beginning to seem a little more real, but still hard to believe it's actually going to happen. Too bad I can't skip time forward about a year!