Throughout my life I have had to go through surgeries from complications of Cystic Fibrosis. Some of these surgeries have been a meconium ileus, endoscopic sinus surgery to remove polyps and congestion, numerous peripheral inserted catheters to fight off infections in the lungs, and a bronchospcopy. Cystic Fibrosis is a multiorgan disease causing problems not just in the lungs and the digestive system but can cause trouble in other organs too. Not only do CFer's have to deal with CF complications but "normal" complications occur as well such as wisdom teeth being pulled and other "common surgeries."
Well, as a woman, I was having some abnormal menstrual cycles and lots of spotting in between periods. I didn't know if these problems were stemming from CF or just a normal girl issue that I had to try to get back to "normal." My OBGYN after years of switching my birth control had decided that she should perform a hysteroscopy where a camera could go up and look around to see if everything looked good. Goody just the thing that I wanted to sign up for, right?!
During the hysteroscopy, my doctor had found a small part of thick tissue that she believed really had no need for being there and wanted to clip it out in her office. She thought that it could be causing my spotting in between periods. I thought Aha!...an answer to my problems, lets do it! I was all for it because she had already busted into freaking Alcatraz with a camera, went up into my cervix, the only thing left was to loot the goodies and leave haha. I was having severe cramping during the hysteroscopy and wanted the experience to be over as soon as possible! She realized that the clippers to cut the tissue out was not sanitized and to my dismay wanted me to make another appointment and do the hysteroscopy again. Who would ever want to sign up for that again? I decided that maybe it would be better to put me under so I wouldn't be in so much pain. And it could be a 1,2,3 procedure.
Boy was I wrong! This Thursday I went in at 7:45 am to prep for my 9:45 am hysteroscopy surgery. I've never had any problems getting put under general anesthesia through the vein and spoke with the anesthesiologist about my past surgeries and what I was allergic to. I'm a bit complicated because my skin is sensitive to tegaderm dressing, chloroprep, and betadine only under IV dressing. The anesthesiologist from the beginning had major concerns because I have Cystic Fibrosis. He talked to me about my options asking if I wanted to do an epideral anesthesia which only made me more nervous about the surgery. I didn't want to do any of his options except for what I was used to which was general anesthesia through the vein. All I could think of was oh my gosh he knows nothing about Cystic Fibrosis and I'm going to not have a good experience. I was extremely nervous wondering if I had made the right decision because I didn't have any of my pulmonary doctors that were there to point my OBGYN doctor and the anesthesiologist in the right direction and give them details of my specific CF case.
I was trying to give as much detail as possible about myself letting them know that when I sleep my O2 stats drop due to lung damage caused by Cystic Fibrosis. Well even "normal" people have a drop in O2 stats while sleeping but mine is a bigger drop. And that my persistent coughing is normal because my airways are always blocked by mucus caused by CF. Throughout my waiting nurses kept on asking, "what's with that cough" and telling me that I shouldn't be going into surgery sick. I felt like a broken record constantly saying I have Cystic Fibrosis and I cough, it's normal that I sound like this. Some understood immediately after I had said I have CF. But still, I would never say that to someone! Everyone should live by not judging a book by it's cover. You never know what someone is going through on the inside.
Finally, it was surgery time! The anesthesiologist asked if I was ready for my mixed cocktail and I told him only if there was sugar on the rim. And all I heard as the syringe of medicine was put into my vein was, one for nausea, one for pain and one for....I think the last one was the goodnight medicine. I was out in two seconds. I woke up 2 hours later with a girl holding an oxygen mask to my face pumping oxygen into my chest. And I was having a coughing fit. I asked if I could please have a cannula for my oxygen instead of the mask because it was causing my asthma to flare up. The anesthesiologist looked worried and came over to my bedside to ask if I was okay. I told him yes as the nurse by my bed kept telling me to take deep breaths. They needed to make sure my oxygen level had gone back to where it was before surgery. My throat was really sore and it was hard for me to swallow. I had found out that during surgery, I started having a spasm while I was under anesthesia and kept on coughing. He told me that I was in a tilted position during the surgery with my bottom half up and my head towards the floor. What idiots! Why would they position me like that! If you put me in a postural drainage position, of course I'm going to cough. All my mucus was probably wanting to come up and out because of my position and I couldn't cough it out because I was under anesthesia. If I wasn't so drugged up I think I would have verbally killed him.
Also, I found out that they had to intubate me and suction up mucus because I couldn't stop coughing during the procedure. Talk about scary! It makes me never want to get put under anesthesia ever again. The next morning after surgery, my whole body hurt. The only body part that did not hurt was my uterus, where my surgery was performed. My shoulders, neck, upper abs, throat, cheeks, mouth, head, and back were killing me. I asked the hospital if the aches were normal and they said that usually people will be sore when they are intubated because the surgeons have to push the patients head back to get the tube device in. As for my abs, I was thinking they probably freaked out when I started to cough and kept on lifting my body up and down to try to get me more oxygen. I was probably like a small ragdoll being tossed around. As for now, I'm resting my body and hoping no blue cap and gown for awhile.
