Surgery - DISCLAIMER - not for the squeamish

Oh boy here we go! Told to be there at 6AM. Yuck. Marty and I go to bed at 8 PM. Right. Anyway, up we get. No coffee for me. Off we go. Check in. They take me back to pre op and make me put the gown on. Nurse comes in to do the intake. Then puts the IV in my arm. OMFG! It hurt like a MF (and I do not mean mondo fajita). In the FYI category, the bruise on the arm lasted for THREE weeks.

Next, they tell me I am off to Radiology for the needle locator (commonly referred to in hospital slang as the needle loc). Back down to the Breast Center. At least they are all my friends by now. They mammo me and with boob clamped, the doc (after xylocaine) inserts a wire into the tumor. Unclamp the boob then I have this wire sticking out my left boob at about 2 o'clock. They place a styrofoam cup over it so now my arm is sticking out kind of like a weight lifter with lots of muscles who can't get his arms to lie straight down. Nice.

Then I sit in the hall way for a while and they take me to nuclear medicine.
NOTE: This is where the squeamish need to stop reading.
I get there and the tech says the radio-isotopes have not arrived yet. So I sit in the waiting room for 15 minutes. They arrive and the tech puts me on a table that is part of a gamma camera. I'm laying there and he gives me ice and tells me to ice my nipple down. I am like, "Are you nuts? I need xylocaine!" He said that they can't give anesthetic because it impairs the movement of the isotope. Then he gets this spray can of numbing stuff and sprays me several times. The the doc comes and does the first of four injections into my nipple. I shriek "F#%$ Me! F*&^ Me! F%*& Me" about 10 times because not only does the needle hurt like a B*&$ch but after it starts going in, my breast felt like it was entirely on fire. I mean it felt like someone had poured boiling oil on my boob.

Then the doc says "All Done." I didn't even feel numbers 2-4 as my poor boob just shut down and gave up the ghost. Have to admit it was kinda cool watching the isotope moving around with the gamma camera. They had a little monitor so I could see it. Back to Pre Op.

Arrive back at 10:00AM. Hanging around waiting. And waiting. And waiting. I overheard that my surgery wasn't scheduled until 1:30. I WENT BALLISTIC!!!! I paced up and down the hallway saying "3-1/2 hours of sitting here waiting with a freakin needle sticking out of me? Are they crazy or just sadists?" This was followed by (a lot of) muttered obscenities.

The nurse came back and told me to get on the gurney. She shot me up with Atavan and it was lights out until the next moring when I woke up in my bed.

Surgery went well. Doc told Marty no node involvement (he took 4).

I was a real PITA for Marty to deal with what with the Atavan in me and that stuff makes me nuts anyway. After we got home I was sitting in one chair and would pass out then I would move to another and pass out and I must have this for over an hour until he dragged me upstairs. That was when I decided I had to have a bath. I have a saint for a husband who allowed me to get in the bathtub around 8 that night and made sure I didn't knock myself out or drown (I remember nothing).When I woke up the next morning and kissed him and said good morning he said, "Thank God you're back."

I love my husband sooooo much!