So, surgery started around 2pm yesterday. I had an arterial line put in which was absolutely no big deal after a big honkin' dose of anti-anxiety meds which the anesthesiologist gave me just to be nice. I have a feeling that it was supposed to hurt a great deal but between that and a numbing agent, it was not at all a big deal.
Got out of surgery and things were a bit hazy until my boyfriend joined me. I was told that everything went well and they took an x-ray of my chest. My boyfriend told me that both of my lungs had collapsed during surgery. I was surprised to notice that my throat wasn't really very sore at all.
I was moved up to my room for Vascular/Thoracic patients and, to my surprise was rooming with a girl a few years older than me who had the exact same surgery with the same doctor just a couple hours previous to me. My pain coming out of surgery was probably an 8 out of 10 but, then again, so was my normal daily pain so it wasn't anything too unmanageable. I was given a few shots of dilaudid and it was under control. The doctor did forget to order a pain pump for me so I went without until about 8:30pm which sucked but once I got that I was pretty comfortable. I also had a "pain ball" filled with lidocaine. It was great at first, but started to spread down my arms to the point that my arms were completely numb and almost completely useless. It's still in me, but it's clamped down so I'm not getting the meds anymore.
I have a vacuum thingy hooked up to 2 chest tubes draining fluid from my chest. I don't find this bothersome.
Surprisingly, I've found the IV Tylenol they're giving me to be fantastically effective at relieving me of the achy feelings I have in my neck and left arm. If I had to guess, this aching is blood flow being restored to my arm as I've never felt anything like it before and seems to coincide with the pulling feeling I get when moving my neck.
A lot of pain seems to have been relieved and a lot of old sensation restored. I feel more strong and my shoulders have fallen back into place. I know it's early, but I feel like when I heal up I'm going to be a very happy camper.