The longest walk EVER

Before you read the rest of this story, you must click this link (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2dQ5c5SIYnc ) and allow it to be your background music as you go with me on my journey!  And feel free to hit repeat so you can truly revel in the awesomeness of this song!

Another glorious part of my doctor's post-op schedule/regimen is to walk as much as I'm able (willing?).  Even in a medicated state, laying in bed for hours on end is boring. Even with facebook and cable.  However, it is rather tricky to just get up and walk when you're hooked up to about 463 different machines by an additional 572 wires, hoses and cables.  After 20 minutes (or what seemed like anyways), I was unburdened from all my technology, including my beloved leg warmers.  Now the real work began! I never knew how challenging it could be to sit up on my own, and swing my legs around to the edge of the bed.  Oh yeah, did I mention that anesthesia, morphine and vicodin combined make any kind of ambulation that much more fun with dizziness.  And being laid out on your back for the better part of a day is gonna do screwy things to your blood pressure if you get up too fast.  For several minutes I hung on grimly and determined to the bed rail, with my entire focus being standing on my own two feet (clothed in fashionable yellow foot socks with safety tread).  Once I felt my feet touch the floor, I knew that one way or another I was going to stand and walk come hell or high water.  With a granite grip on my IV pole, and a herculean effort, I finally stood, wobbled, scared the hell out of the nurse & tech waiting to catch me, and finally stabilized in a near upright position.  It was glorious!  Choirs of angels came down from the heavens, and cherubim peaked out from the fluorescent light fixtures playing harps.  Or perhaps the uber drug combo combined with the reflection of the city skyline from the window for a seriously awesome hallucination?  Naw...let's stick with reality. ;)

I'm sure most of you dear readers have never had a hysterectomy, or major lower abdominal surgery, but I can tell you it's a crazy bizarre feeling to have all your organs, especially your intestines, shift around in new ways.  My belly felt like it was hanging with tension.  I guess if you wanted to really understand, imagine a half filled water balloon being dangled in mid air by it's top.  Even though I wasn't feeling any pain, I was afraid to stand fully up to my proper 5'6" height.  All in all a very curious feeling.

My first walk was low/no pressure, and the nurse said it was up to me to decide how far I wanted to go. Once I'd made it to the door of my room, I scanned either end of the hall and realized there weren't any real halfway points since the nurses station was one door down from me.  I set my goal on the emergency exit door at the shorter end of the hall.  For those few minutes, the entire scope of my world was oriented on two things: placing my palm on that door, and making sure I didn't trip over the catheter hanging down my leg. I know, TMI and Ewwww!  Step by painfully slow step, I did the old lady hag shuffle down the hall, with the nurse ready to grab my free arm in case I started to go down.  With the passing of each room, I glanced in to see what other patients were experiencing, and  for the most part they were either empty or had people sleeping.  As touching the emergency exit door became more and more of a reality, it suddenly occurred to me that although my end goal was in sight, I was going to have to make the return trip back to my room.  Damn, why didn't I think of that ahead of time!  DOH!  *forehead smack*

Finally, I reached the end of the hall, slapped my palm on the door (secretly hoping to set off some secret alarm!), shuffled around a 180, and looked down a hallway that had easily grown exponentially longer than when I first started my journey.  On a side note, the song running through my head through all this was The Greatest Adventure (of which you are currently listening to if you followed my instructions at the beginning of this entry.  If you haven't, then you're a poopstick and need to click it now, and start reading again from the beginning.)  The walk back to my room was surprisingly uneventful - no face plants or tripping over the catheter.  The worst part of the whole walk was at the end when, weak, exhausted and only wanting to crawl back into bed (even with my legwarmers),  I had to feebly hang on to my sweet blessed IV pole while the nurse straightened up my bed.  Finally she was finished and with the same herculean effort it took to stand up, I slowly eased my way back into a blissful prone position.  Another 20 minutes to hook me back up to all my equipment, and I was able to get back to my woodstock-like drug haze.