People always want to know how I'm doing. Am I still excited? Or am I nervous? My friend (and angel) asked my daughter this about me, and my daughter replied with, "She seems to be still excited." My angel friend said, "Yah. She's nervous."
Really, when I am awake I feel zero fear about the surgery. Once in a while I feel something deep inside me that I recognize as probably fear, but I remember my faith and reasoning, and I don't feel it at all anymore. However, I am aware that stress can show up in the body, so I have been watching.
I can sleep like a baby on concrete, although I prefer a softer surface. I have never had problems with sleep comfort until about 10 days before this surgery, when for 2 days I woke up with my back muscles hurting like crazy in the morning and all that day! It has been a couple of days since, and although I don't wake up hurting like that, even in my sleep I can feel myself toss and turn as though I am deeply disturbed about something. Then, this morning I noticed that I have a yeast infection deep in my belly button! It doesn't itch. I just laughed! I love my body and how it communicates with me! It is doing a great job! I suppose the "myriad of changing emotions" I was told I would likely go through is taking form on the inside more than the outside.
Today is Wednesday, and the surgery is next Tuesday. I had some pre-op labs done today, and I get to do one more set next Monday. They would have completed all of them today, had I been able to get to the lab in the hospital I will be having the surgery at, but I couldn't, so I did as much as I could at a lab in a hospital in my own town. Only the sample or test next Monday (one day before surgery) does the hospital doing the surgery have to complete themselves.
I found out that today my recipient friend also had pre-op labs. We are retaking tests we have already passed, just in case anything has changed since our last test and we have recently been unknowingly exposed to anything that could cause this transplant to fail or transfer a disease. With the tests I took today, they are tissue typing again and testing for certain transmittal diseases. 6 vials this time. This lab technician chose not to use a butterfly. I was nervous about the changing of vials, but she promised this was her specialty. Turns out, she was really very good!
Something I was not expecting at all is how people are offering to support me. I still haven't told anybody, unless there is either a need or they ask me. Those who know, though, are excited and praying for us (my recipient friend and I). My recipient friend and my angel friend have a list of people who want to bring meals to my family when it is needed, whether it be when we return home from the hospital or after my parents return to their home and I'm left alone with my children. (My husband works in another town during the week and comes home to be with us on the weekends. He is very helpful, but not as much when he is away at work.)
These offers make me feel loved and cared for, and I will take them up on their offers if there is a need, because I believe in taking care of myself and healing right the first time, without taking any risk of hurting myself by trying to prove how together I am. I won't take advantage. If I do that, then when there is a real need, help may not be as accessible when I need. I am truly grateful for their offers and to know that help is only a phone call away!
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