9:30 in the morning at an O.C. Hospital is not my idea of fun but I was excited that I would finally have a working band!!!
Owens explained that he would not do a fluoroscope on me because he felt they were very difficult to read (see the second photo below, the arrow shows the leaking dye in a flouroscope). They worked for large, obvious lap band issues but not slight, subtle problems. A fluoroscope is a procedure where the band is filled with a dye that shows up on an xray and enables the physician to see where the band is leaking. He told me he would put me under a general, get in there and inject a colored dye- he felt this was a MUCH better way to detect the leak. I was fine with that. The last thing I wanted was for him to replace my port and the problem be with my tubing or the band itself (this, btw, is what my previous surgeon's PA had planned to do). With Dr. Owens plan, there would be less cutting, less anesthesia use and less trauma to my already traumatized body.
5 hours later, I was finally being wheeled into surgery, after almost having some other lady who came in about 10 minutes earlier being told she was going next. When my nurse called Dr. Owens to tell him I'd been waiting since 9:30am he told her, "Well then send her over!" Someone got their wires crossed here- I don't know who it was but I wasn't about to reschedule after waiting five hours, having not eaten or had anything to drink since 9pm the night before, and suffering through a migraine while waiting for my surgery time. I just wanted it done so I could back on the right road. Needless to say, I was not the on rescheduling- Woo-Hoo!. Sorry, other lady : / .
When I awoke after surgery, I was still in the O.R. Like my previous surgery, everyone around me was shocked to see me awake so quickly. You can't keep a crazy woman down, I guess. The first thing I noticed was, "Good God! My head is still killing me! How is it they could use all those drugs and my head still hurt?" Then, "Oh my Lord, what is that? My throat and my next hurt so bad. . .must have had to intubate me, crap that hurts!" Then I focused on my gut. . .not too bad actually. About that same time, suddenly, every lick of pain left my body. I can only assume someone put some kind of pain meds in my IV. When I got to recovery, my gut hurt a little so they gave me a shot of pain medication. I'm one of those weird cases, I can't take most pain meds: Valium, Vicodin, Morphine, Delaudid, Codeine, as I get SEVERE headaches from them. For my first surgery, they gave me Darvocet but I was being told it had been removed from the market since my surgery last- uh, yeah, that was a bit scary. So they were giving me a medicine called Tramadol. The shot worked great.
The recovery nurses were fun, hanging out by my bed, we were joking and laughing, They had disco music playing in recovery and I told them that all they needed was a disco ball and they could have their own club. Well, of course we were cracking up- you'd never known I just came out of a room where I'd had 2 plastic contraptions pulled from and pushed into my gut with long metal poles inserted into my abdomen to maneuver everything around. It was weird in a way I guess, but it was a much nicer memory than my first surgery recovery room where staff was talking smack about other staff members, cussing, calling people names. Totally unprofessional. I'll take the happy, joking disco nurses any damn day!
Brian told me that Owens injected my band with dye and could find no leak. He decided to remove my old band and put in a whole new one- this way there was no doubt that the leak had been dealt with. My old band was sent to pathology for further inspection. He told Brian he was able to use the track of the old band so no new sutures were put into my stomache. The 'track' Owens was referring to is made when you first have your lap band put in. They bring up sections of the stomach around the band and suture them into place. This helps the band stay in the proper position (photo just above)) and also why you DO NOT want to throw up for the first couple of months after surgery!
We finally left the hospital at around 9pm and we were finally headed home. I was happy, Brian was happy- worried, but happy, and I just couldn't WAIT to get into my own jammies and bed!
Owens explained that he would not do a fluoroscope on me because he felt they were very difficult to read (see the second photo below, the arrow shows the leaking dye in a flouroscope). They worked for large, obvious lap band issues but not slight, subtle problems. A fluoroscope is a procedure where the band is filled with a dye that shows up on an xray and enables the physician to see where the band is leaking. He told me he would put me under a general, get in there and inject a colored dye- he felt this was a MUCH better way to detect the leak. I was fine with that. The last thing I wanted was for him to replace my port and the problem be with my tubing or the band itself (this, btw, is what my previous surgeon's PA had planned to do). With Dr. Owens plan, there would be less cutting, less anesthesia use and less trauma to my already traumatized body.
When I awoke after surgery, I was still in the O.R. Like my previous surgery, everyone around me was shocked to see me awake so quickly. You can't keep a crazy woman down, I guess. The first thing I noticed was, "Good God! My head is still killing me! How is it they could use all those drugs and my head still hurt?" Then, "Oh my Lord, what is that? My throat and my next hurt so bad. . .must have had to intubate me, crap that hurts!" Then I focused on my gut. . .not too bad actually. About that same time, suddenly, every lick of pain left my body. I can only assume someone put some kind of pain meds in my IV. When I got to recovery, my gut hurt a little so they gave me a shot of pain medication. I'm one of those weird cases, I can't take most pain meds: Valium, Vicodin, Morphine, Delaudid, Codeine, as I get SEVERE headaches from them. For my first surgery, they gave me Darvocet but I was being told it had been removed from the market since my surgery last- uh, yeah, that was a bit scary. So they were giving me a medicine called Tramadol. The shot worked great.
The recovery nurses were fun, hanging out by my bed, we were joking and laughing, They had disco music playing in recovery and I told them that all they needed was a disco ball and they could have their own club. Well, of course we were cracking up- you'd never known I just came out of a room where I'd had 2 plastic contraptions pulled from and pushed into my gut with long metal poles inserted into my abdomen to maneuver everything around. It was weird in a way I guess, but it was a much nicer memory than my first surgery recovery room where staff was talking smack about other staff members, cussing, calling people names. Totally unprofessional. I'll take the happy, joking disco nurses any damn day!
We finally left the hospital at around 9pm and we were finally headed home. I was happy, Brian was happy- worried, but happy, and I just couldn't WAIT to get into my own jammies and bed!
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