Reality check

Yesterday I went to St Helier for my pre-op assessment, Amy came with me which I was so grateful for as the whole experience was a big reality check. I think all along I had just been treating the surgery as just another step in my treatment schedule but boy oh boy it is the biggy!

They explained everything to me , how the operation could be about 4-5 hours long and then I have to go to the high depenency unit; explaining to Amy not to be distressed at the sight of me with tubes, pipes and drains out of almost every orifice plus an oxygen mask - it's obviously not scheduled to be one of most glamerous days and you just know I'm going to have 'bed hair'!! It appears I will be like that for about 4-5 days before they start taking everything out and I will feel something resembling 'normal' again. I will not be allowed anything to eat so will have fluids via a drip and the occassional 15ml of water to 'wet my mouth', this is a far cry from the 2-3 litres that I drink each day at the moment. I apparently should get lose about a stone whilst I'm in there (what is it they say about always being a silver lining!).

The other thing which I hadn't even realised, was that I am not allowed to lift anything for about 6 weeks afterwards or do the housework (there's that silver lining again!)but also no driving for possibly 4 weeks. Don't get me wrong, I knew it was major surgery but not this big - maybe I was just in denial, but I must say I am dreading it now and it seems to be coming up so fast.

Today I am at the Marsden for CT and MRI scans. It is such a shame that they cannot do the surgery there, their whole attitude is so different and since the whole hospital is for treating cancer they seem to have such compassion with your situation depite the fact that they have seen and heard it all before. It was a bit of a worry when the nurse doing my assessment said that if they find a problem with the lymph nodes it would just mean 6 months of chemotherapy after the operation - I asked her if that was on top of the 3 months that I have already got scheduled in and she said "probably not then, I don't know much about chemotherapy". Needless to say I will be discussing it with my nurse at the Marsden today as they have not indicated there is a problem with my lymph nodes, I do wish people would read the notes fully before making such comments, it really winds me up!

Am now on the Rescue Remedy to try to calm me down!