11th October - hysterectomy memoirs

I haven't begun to write up the hysterectomy story parts 2 and 3 yet, they are epics in themselves...

But while I've got this writing business going again, I thought I better not down my experience in these early days of no more uterus.

So today marks the 18th day post surgery.

It's an unusual milestone, in that it's not a special milestone by any means... Just that I've found some motivation to note down the memories and how I feel right now.

Week 1 was a lot easier than I thought it would've been. Don't get me wrong, it was very uncomfortable but I was not so much in pain because I was dosed up with painkillers. Just not able to move around easily and unable to bend down, bend over or stretch above my shoulders. And I couldn't easily turn my body without wincing. And tired. So very very tired.

I could feel my insides moving around trying to fill the now empty space and trying to settle into a good permanent position. It was a weird sensation. Not painful but not a comfortable experience.

The external incisions are healing very well, they don't hurt at all and the glue will peel off by itself. I can't see the internal wounds but as I don't feel any pain, there is no swelling or heat in the area and no unusual bleeding so I take that to be a good sign.

I shuffle walk slowly everywhere and haven't been outdoors in a week. Getting up off the couch or a chair or the bed is difficult. Not using my abs to do things is more difficult than I ever imagined. Just the simple act of sitting up in bed requires abs. I couldn't just roll over in bed to a cooler spot because I need abs, I had to use my hands to lift my butt and reposition it in bed before moving my shoulders across.

I had to sleep on my back because although technically I can sleep however I want, sleeping on my side hurt so much, it felt like gravity pulling all my guts downwards to one side.

I was told to wear some super unsexy compression socks to bed to prevent blood clots and DVT. When you cannot bend over, putting on pants and socks is hard to do so compression socks is even harder to do on your own.

I managed to keep it up for a week and then gave up.

Having a shower is also a lot of effort. Basically it takes so much effort that I need a nap immediately afterwards. So I decided not to shower every day to conserve energy.

Doctor told me that my body went through a lot of shock. Holes were poked. Things were cut, blood was lost and an organ was removed. My body needs time to adjust to such big changes and to heal itself. So a lot of my energy is spent healing itself. And taking a shower or going for a walk takes a lot of energy that it doesn't have. The body knows what to prioritise, it really is an impressive design.

So I took on doctors orders and hung up my superhero cape and put on my princess tiara instead. It was time to rest and recuperate. 

Also during this week I had a job interview. Timing wasn't great but I did it and I don't know how I managed to pull that through. It went super well!

Week 2 went a lot better. I still am very tired but I decided to ease off the painkillers to see how I go. I'm quite ok. I also went for a walk around the block. What normally took less than 20mins took me about 15mins, but I feel accomplished. And I saw the sun for reals this time. Shame about having to wear a mask.

Over the weekend, Lu and I watched a stand up comedy show and we'll, belly laughing hurts. I was so conflicted, I wanted to keep watching it but also had to avoid laughing... Or at least not laugh so hard. We watched the whole thing.

Which reminds me, coughing and sneezing are not good things to do post hysterectomy. It feels like your guts are blown out of your body. Who knew coughing and sneezing requires so much ab strength?!

I went for a walk almost everyday. Just 10-15mins but I feel more mobile and less discomfort.

I also stopped taking the strong painkiller at night which helped me sleep... And guess what? I couldn't sleep for 3 nights straight.

Apparently post surgery insomnia could be a number of things...  Body healing has thrown out my sleep rhythm. Weaning off painkillers also throws out your sleep patterns for a little bit... Hormones are also trying to balance itself out so that may play a part... All I know is that I'm very very tired but I cannot sleep at night. I can. Mod off easily during the day for a few hours which is good but not enough.

I had my 2nd and 3rd interview this week, and 2nd one went alright but I totally fucked up the 3rd one. I hope I was charming enough and the other candidates fuck it up just as much that I pull through. Many fingers crossed because I really need a change and I don't want to keep searching for jobs. It's boring.

Discomfort and pain are almost all over. I weighed myself this week and I lost 2kg posty surgery. My stomach is noticeably smaller. It's not flat and I've definitely gained covid weight but at least I know part of it was due to the big fibroids inside my body.

What did surprise me was the sudden flush of red on the liner on day 13. Although I was kind of expecting it because all literature tells me that as the stiches inside the body dissolve, it will get expelled by the body around the 2 week mark. 

I haven't had a period since end of July, and seeing any spot of bright red alarmed me. I want to call doctors and ask but in my mind I know it's expected. There is no swelling, no pain and no full pad of blood, just a couple of spots here and there. Enough for a liner only. I'm fine, but I'm still also freaking out.

Today marks week 3 and I'm still tired but I made it through my first day back at work. I didn't fall asleep during the day.

I call that a win!

At night, another few drops of red appeared after a day or so of nothing. It is bothering me but I think more from bad past experience. I'm scarred by my last few periods. It looked like a monthly murder scene. Globs of clots the size of small aliens fell out of my body. Blobs so large they didn't fit down the drain without me first breaking it apart. It was frightening to experience! I'm scarred. But I know it will never ever need to happen again. This short term discomfort will not last and I will be happy forever!

4th October 2021 - Changed woman - Part 1

 After yesterday's epic post, I had neglected to mention a very important update on myself. This tends to happen whenever I bring up memories of 2018 and the loss of my mother. I get distracted with those emotions that I still feel so strongly despite 3.5 years having passed.

Before I get distracted again, my big news!

I am with uterus no more. I am a changed woman, but for the better.

Yes, as of 23rd September 2021, I had a hysterectomy to remove my uterus along with some pesky fibroids that were causing me issues over the years. Issues that I had no idea were problems until small pieces of puzzle were put together in recent months.

I'm a bit battered and bruised, well... not bruised, I'm faring quite well actually. A bit uncomfortable but overall mending very well so far.

How do I even start to tell this story?

How did it get to this stage where I had to make such a drastic choice as to lose my uterus to save my life?

I think the best way to outline this memory is from the beginning...

I have always been known as that girl who coughs a lot. Literally years and years of reputation. Because when I start coughing, it will last for 3-4 months. Yep, a very big chunk of the year is spent with me coughing my lungs out.

It doesn't usually start with a cold or flu, I don't even get a sore throat, it just starts one day, and it will linger around for months. If I had to take time of work because of this cough, I would not have any stable job at all.

It became a running joke with everyone I worked with. Oh gosh, there she goes, Mae and her cough...

And then the questions "have you been to see a doctor? taken cough medicine? naturopath? Tried chinese herbal medicine? lungs checked? Tried honey? Honey with lemon? is it asthma? or some random obscure scientifically unproven home remedy..."

What do you think my answer is? No, I enjoy having this irritating cough that hurts my voice and makes it difficult for me to speak, and makes me seem like I am constantly sick when I am not... No, I have not tried any of those obvious solutions that you have recommended because I am a sucker for punishment....

OF COURSE I HAVE FUCKING TRIED ALL THOSE FUCKING THINGS, AND THEN SOME!

I am not an idiot. I do not enjoy coughing my lungs out because everything hurts, my throat hurts, my chest hurts, my abs hurt. Once upon a time, I coughed so hard, I sprained my back and couldn't get out of bed for 3 days. Let me tell you - That was not fun. Coughing for months on end is no fun. 

So yes, I have tried many things. I have seen many doctors. All have given me no new information. They check my throat, not inflamed, they check my lungs, it sounds healthy. It's just minor irritation they say, just take some over the counter cough meds or cough lollies, it will go away on its own.

Yes... it does eventually go away on its own... it just takes awhile... months in fact.

I hear what you're thinking now, wait wait, I thought this was a story about my hysterectomy? But you're writing about a cough?

Yes, I know - but hear me out... it's a long story, and I don't want to forget the details.

So, after years of nothing useful from various GPs, I had resigned myself to the fact that I may have to live with this stupid condition for the rest of my life, that was until this little thing called a global pandemic hits us in 2020.

Coronovirus.

Urgh.... the worst time to ever have a cough in public. You become an immediate pariah as soon as a sneeze or cough is heard. Don't let me out in public... but I cannot NOT go to work. I mean, my colleagues are aware of my issue but not everyone in the office understands and it is very understandable for them to be suspicious of someone in the office with a horrible sounding cough.

Fucking covid-19.

So I take a covid test, it returns a negative result and I go to see yet another new GP... and this time, she suspects it might be allergy related. Oh, goodness a new diagnosis. So I get a prescription of antihistamines and ventolin inhaler....

And I must say, it does work to some extent but not completely. It does suppress my cough for a little bit. So for a good 12 months I tell anyone who is concerned, it's just allergies and that gets easily understood. People understand allergies, but they don't understand unknown chronic months long coughing.

So in 2020, the cough goes on from early Jan to April. a 4mth long cough. I am sore.

Skip through to Jan 2021, and the darn cough returns, but so does covid-19... this time around, a good friend's mother had recently died as a result of cancer that had spread all over her body. Her symptom was a chronic cough that wouldn't go away and the outcome was the worst possible scenario. She passed away a few short months after being diagnosed. 

Because of covid-19 and my friend guilting me into getting my health checked out, I did return to yet another new GP to see what they have to say...

This time around was a bumbling middle-aged male GP... as I was a new patient of his, and after hearing me out for 2 minutes, he ordered that I get a full blood test as well as an x-ray of my lungs so that he obtains some detail about my health history.

Dutifully, I head off first to the x-ray place because their opening hours were more accessible, and then the following week I headed to pathology to get a blood test thinking nothing much of it.

The x-ray returned a result of everything normal. Lungs and heart all normal - so basically, nothing to see here ladies and gents... move along to the next thing.

I remember it so clearly, I had the blood test on a Thursday, they told me it would be with my GP within the next 3 days so I didn't expect to hear back until the following week, but on the Friday I receive a call from the new GP telling me my blood test results were returned and there were some concerning things he needed to discuss with me in person, was I available to visit the clinic that afternoon?

Now, here I was at work, busy as all fuck, and unexpectedly receive a phone call from the doctor telling me the results of my blood test were concerning and he could only tell me in person? What was a girl to think? How was I supposed to react?

My next thoughts were I have a dinner catch up with some old colleagues that night that I really didn't want to miss (we had just been released from lockdown number 4 at that stage and I was rearing to go out for any reason and I wasn't missing out).

So instead, I made an appointment for 8:30am on Saturday morning. It meant that I couldn't have too late a night, and still had to wake up early on the weekend. Ah well... it had to be done.

So Saturday, 8th May 2021, I head off to the clinic and see a completely different doctor because my usual GP didn't work weekends. This doctor looked at my results and told me that my vitamin D levels were very low, but more concerningly my irons were less than 1, and my haemoglobins were 49.

Without context these numbers didn't mean anything to me. He informed me that normal iron levels should be between 35.5-44.9 so a result of less than 1 was very very bad. And haemoglobins should be between 120g/L - 160 g/L - so 49 is considered dangerously low. In fact, I was at risk of heart failure because irons produce haemoglobins, and haemoglobins transport oxygen around the body. When these are low, the heart has to work harder to pump blood around the body to transport oxygen. 

I sat there in shock for a few seconds.

He did a check up of my lungs, he checked if I had other symptoms such as shortness of breath (no), tiredness (yes, but didn't think it was out of ordinary, just normal lack of sleep tiredness), dizziness (no), feeling faint (no), feeling weak (how do you judge this?), pale skin (I didn't think so...).

Then he strongly urged me to go straight the local hospital emergency department as I needed an urgent blood transfusion to rectify this issue immediately otherwise I have a high potential of dropping dead from heart failure.

He wrote me a referral letter and printed out all the test results for me to take with me.

I was in shock, and I didn't know how to react. I walked slowly back to the car and sat there crying for a good 10-15mins. I was scared.

Then I texted Lu to let her know. As we had just been released from lockdown, she was away that weekend in Daylesford I think so I literally had nobody for support. That was a tough moment to get through on my own.

I calmed myself down, and no... I didn't go straight to hospital. I am a practical person, I know how the ED works, I could potentially be sitting there for 8-10 hours, especially with all the covid crazy shit happening. It could potentially be longer...

So, no I didn't take myself straight to hospital. Instead went to the supermarket to get some snacks, then I went home and grabbed a book, a back up charger, bottle of water, fruit, scarf - things that could keep me occupied and not hungry for a few hours. I am born a practical girl.

Then at about 10:30am I made it to the ED reception to check in and prepared for a long wait.

Surprisingly I waited only a couple of hours. I think they came out to get me after about 2 hours, and they checked me out, acted shocked by the results, took another blood test to make sure it wasn't a mistake the first time. And then I waited. And waited. And waited on a bed in ED.

They were afraid that I was at risk of fainting, especially if I went to the toilet, so I wasn't allowed to go to the toilet on my own... but I did use the toilet anyway. Everywhere I went, every nurse and doctor I came across was surprised that I looked not sickly at all. That I wasn't faint or weak. That I was sitting up talking to them, quite alert.

I had heard lots of stories of ED being overwhelmed and I was fully prepared to wait, to not be informed about what was going on, to receive suboptimal service but that is far from the truth. My experience was exceptional. Everyone I came across at the Western General was incredible. Yes I did have to wait, but it was a busy hospital afterall, but not for as long as I thought I needed to. I was informed every step of the way what they needed to do or check.

After the blood test, I sat in the ED bed for literally hours waiting for the results to come back. When it did, my haemoglobins had dropped from 49 to 45, and immediately they ordered blood for a transfusion and transferred me to the short stay ward. By this stage, it was about 4pm, I'd been there over 5 hours. 

And then more waiting. This time waiting for the blood packs to arrive. I was to have 3 bags of blood.

By this stage, I knew I needed to let dad know that I was gonna be home for dinner, but I couldn't call him because both my arms had IVs attached and I couldn't bend them to make calls. I could only send messages... I was keeping Lu and Kent updated on what was going on but didn't need dad to be worried. So Lu needed to call dad to let him know. I had Kent on stand by in case he needed to drive me home that night. At this stage, I still wasn't sure if I was to stay the night, or if I was discharged whether I was allowed to drive home on my own...

Waiting for a blood transfusion to finish is one of the most boring things to do. You literally cannot do anything. Just sit there and wait for the blood to drip in. 3 bags took about 3-4 hours.

For reasons I'm not sure of, they moved me from a 4 bed shared ward to a single private room with my own bathroom. Maybe because all the other patients were old men? I'm not sure... but I ain't complaining.

So for the last 2 hours of my stay, I was in a room by myself. It was great. I even got a meal, which was gratefully accepted because although I had snacks, I had not eaten since breakfast and I was bloody starving.

Finally, a gorgeous young doctor came to see me at the end of the night, asked how I felt, whether I knew what caused the low haemoglobins, I told him I didn't... I went to see my GP about a cough, and ended up in hospital for a blood transfusion for something completely different!

He asked if I felt exhausted, short of breath etc etc.. I told him no... not more than usual etc...

He said, gosh, we've never seen someone come in with such low numbers like that, you're quite the miracle. You're gonna feel like a million bucks by Monday, work better watch out, superwoman is coming! LOLs, he was gorgeous.

I was discharged around 10:30pm, and was allowed to drive myself home. 

So this epic story turned out to be just the beginning of my hysterectomy journey!

Stay tuned for part 2, and part 3 

Um, hello.... A long awaited return (3rd Oct 2021)

 Hello me, it's been awhile since I've touched on this page. I guess life gets in the way at the best of times, and the worst of times. And oh boy! There have been some doozies of the best and worst of times.

There is no possible way for me to itemise all of those moments in one post, but I may revisit those over time if I get the inclination to continue to draft up memories. The last time I posted was when Sebastien was born, the cheeky little man who whirlwinded his way into our lives and made it so much better than we can ever imagine. Seb is now almost 8 years old and I don't know if he will ever understand the massive universe of love and adoration that he has been born into.

Well since 2013 there has been another addition of a small human into our lives. Miss Harper who is now 5 and half years old is a gorgeous, chatty, loud, energic and super creative boss lady and we love her for it!

She loves to draw, she never stops drawing and I want to keep all her artwork however, due to the prolific nature of work, I don't think this will be possible so we will just have to keep pictures of most of them. I want to continue to encourage this creativity because she does have a talent.

So, coming back to my return. Why am I here again?

Well, I guess... I want a way to be able to remember all these emotions and feelings that I have at the moment. So much has happened over the past 8 years, and I regret not documenting my feelings at the time. I believe we grow by knowing ourselves and although I am generally quite a self-aware person, I do like to go over how I may have felt and acted once upon a time.... and how I have changed, whether for better for worse - hopefully only for the better though!

As a summary, I spent 10 long years in the same company... they were good to me, I learnt a lot, but it was perhaps 7 years too long and my professional growth was hampered as a result and now I feel like I have to catch up against people who are 10-12 years younger than me. It's hard work but I keep going. I won't give up.

In 2016, dad suffered a haemorrhaging stomach ulcer which caused him to collapse at home and then due to his body being in shock of losing so much blood, it triggered a heart attack whilst he was in the hospital ED. It was a very traumatising day for me, and for my family. Slowly and eventually he recovered but it was hard work. 

In 2017, due to stress I resigned from cosy job to re-focus my life. To look after myself. Best thing I've ever done. 

In 2018, I started the year in my dream job, working with inspiring people but an asshole of a boss. A bully by all definitions of the word. I started the job with a level of confidence the world could not contain and I left the job 4 months later a diminished person, a shadow of who I was and questioning every part of myself. Questioning whether I knew how to do my job...  It was a terrible experience that I never want anyone to go through in their working life.

Shortly after that, in April 2018 my parents were both involved in a serious car accident. On the day of my sister's birthday. 

It was not a good day.

A road that dad had driven thousands of times before over the past 40 years, driving slowly (~20-30km/hr), nobody was drug or alcohol affected (it was about 7:30am), there was morning traffic.... maybe in a moment of distraction, we will never really know... dad clipped the back of a truck in front and spun the car around. No other vehicle was involved, the truck was unscathed.

I remember every detail of that day like it was yesterday. Seared into my brain. It was confusion, uncertainty, lots of waiting and unsure what was going on... nobody in the hospital could tell us anything useful. Dad was in emergency department and then transferred to a ward. He was awake and alert in a bit of pain. He had fractured his spine but overall did not suffer any other injuries. Lucky fucker.

Mum on the other hand, we didn't see her at all. She lost consciousness on arrival to the emergency dept and was sent packets of blood, and other life saving measures. She was sent straight to theatre to repair some injuries she sustained in the crash. Her bowels were damaged, and she suffered trauma to various other parts of her body... but it was serious. 

We only learnt over the next several weeks what the extent of her injuries were. 

• Perforated bowels that were resected several times.
• Fractured spine
• Broken neck
• Fractured collar bone
• Broken wrist
• Bruised kidneys and liver
• Potential brain injury 
• Potential spinal damage affecting legs

The last 2 were never really confirmed since she never regained consciousness so they could not assess if these would have been a major impact.

Unfortunately, mum fought for 4 long hard weeks in ICU but ultimately could not overcome the damage her body sustained. Her body gave up the fight on 20th May 2018. She had just turned 69 unconscious in an ICU bed the day before.

She never saw her precious grandchildren again.

We were crushed.

We are still crushed.

Our lives changed in an instant through nobody's fault. There was nobody to blame. Just pure bad luck.

Life sucks sometimes.

I sometimes wonder if it would've made a difference if I could find somebody to blame... would I feel better? I will never know.

And thus 2018 started off the worse year of my life.

Somehow miraculously I still managed to finish my MBA with somewhat good grades. I can't tell you how that happened since I think I did the last 6 units of the course in a fog of grief.

My old boss offered me an opportunity to return to work for them in a temporary casual position, with work days and hours to suit my studies. I could basically pick and choose the days and hours I worked. It was too good to be true.

Except for the fact I had to work with the world's dumbest dumbass. A weirdo in every sense of the word. I wish I could forget him but someone so fucking dumb is quite unforgettable. The weirdo carried his backpack with him everywhere he went in the office. He carried it to meetings, to the bathroom, to lunch... I wonder if there was some sort of precious cargo in there? Or maybe a severed human head... who knows. He was weird.

He was dumb enough to not know how to do his job or understand what his job was, but just smart enough to know that when you are identified as an under-performer, you must drag someone down with you. Guess who he decided to drag down with him? 

Yes. Yours truly.

He accused me of bullying and intimidating him and so he was too scared to learn his job.

*GAGS* *CHOKES* *COUGHS* *VOMIT*

My first thought was: has he MET me? I don't know that anyone in the history of ever has ever found me intimidating.... Gosh

But unfortunately for dumbass dude was he didn't realise how much loved I was in this company. Literally everybody loved me and has known me for well over 10 years. I didn't have to prove anything. But it didn't alleviate the stress I felt at the time.

I offered to take some leave or work from home and avoid the office while they sort out their situation. I didn't need to be there, and I didn't ask for this situation and I don't need the stress.

Long story short, they gave him another few weeks to re-learn the job, and then they let him go because ultimately, you can never teach a dumbass new tricks. It was all just a waste of time. They wasted 8 weeks of everybody's life on a useless idiot.

I travelled to China on a study tour and that was the best thing I could have possibly done for myself. I met some wonderful people, I learnt a lot, I experienced a lot and China was not what I expected. 

It was the first time in the year that I had time to myself to not have to care or think about anyone else but myself. It was wonderfully freeing. I should do more of that in the future.

By year end, I had made it. Handed in my final assignment, did my last exam and got it all over and done with. 

I had survived.

I was battered and bruised but I made it. I can do anything!

2019 was a whole new different type of challenge but after what I had gone through in 2018, it felt like a breeze.

First up, it took a lot longer than I ever expected to find work. Far too long. 7 long months of no work. Circling in my head constantly was the thought that perhaps I just am not as good as I thought? Perhaps Dickhead boss was right, I'm actually a useless person.... 

Each and every rejection came with an added tinge of 'there ya go, confirmed, you are shit, you are useless, why do you think you're any good at anything?'

It was hard getting out of bed. It was hard to keep motivated. I applied to over almost 200 jobs and got close so many times... so what was it about me that wasn't right?

All I knew was that my confidence was diminishing every minute of every day that I wasn't successful. 

Eventually I began to sign up to temping agencies just to get some temping work.

The first assignment they sent me to was as a project coordinator to a security business out in the burbs. I was must say I was less than interested but I know I needed to show interest in order for them to keep sending me on assignments. 

The brief was security business, b o r i n g! Located out in the burbs which meant that public transport was not viable, I needed a car, and I didn't have one. And it was a contract, 6 months which was not long enough and not short enough... annoying.

Anyway, interview went amazingly well. The boss was young, energetic and dynamic. So intelligent. So magnetic. It was hard not to accept the offer.

The first few weeks I was so lost and afraid that every little thing I did could cause me to lose my job. Confidence had been completely sapped out of me. 

Eventually, I found my rhythm, and I found my place and I did my thing. And they love me.

Somehow miraculously I find myself still here 2 years down the track. And now I need to do more. But what is next on my career trajectory?

Amidst all of this chaos of a new role, a sudden worldwide pandemic hits our lives. 

Covid-19, Coronovirus, alpha strain, delta strain, mask mandates, lockdowns... all words that were not in common use until 2020.

When covid hit us in Australia in March 2020, our lives changed. I discovered a lot about myself. 

But I think that is a post for another day. Covid has been in our lives for almost 2 years now, and it's a lot of reflection to have to go through. Truth be told, we will probably never be rid of it, but if we can eventually control it then that's the best we can hope for.

For now. today's project milestone is reached. Total word count 2005.