Heart Sick (9)

Day #2. July 31, 2006.

I didn’t sleep too well, but it was better than I expected, probably due to the medication they gave me. I woke up at around 7am and took a shower, changed into a fresh set of cloths and waited anxiously.

But things did not happen as ‘excitedly’ as I expected; my breakfast came at around 8.30am, and later I was referred to a physiotherapist, who explained to me the importance of post-surgery re-habitation programs. It would involve lung exercise to ‘retrain’ my lung to work for maximum amount of oxygen, as ‘the natural reaction’ after the rips were cut (during the surgery) would prevent me from making any deep breathing, thus restricting my oxygen intake. I was given a Spirometer to ‘exercise’ my lung and measure the oxygen intake, and was expected to start the routine ‘3 to 4 days after the surgery’.

Sent back to my room, and another gentleman was waiting. This time another medical officer asked if I was interested to participate in a survey program to determine the effect of anesthesia on my memory; well I thought why not? It might as well helped ease my tension by keeping myself busy. I was grilled with loads of tricky questions testing my memory for about 30 minutes, and finally he said he’d come back again after my surgery with another session, so it’d give him a good idea how the medications would have done to my brain. I thought he has done enough damages to it with just his grilling alone!

Then came around noon, and the nurse came in and informed me ‘it’s almost time’. I changed into the surgery robe and started to feel cold feet (and the rest of my body too). Then my surgeon came in to check on me, “you’ll be ok, not to worry!”. He said.

Almost 1pm, and I was pushed into the operating theater. I was amazingly calm, probably because of the pill they gave me earlier. They made another infusion right on my neck’s main artery (where Dracula bites? ‘For quick medication administration during the surgery’, so said the anesthetist). Boy that was a scary one, imagine they punch a hole in your neck and the free flow of bloods… although I didn’t really feel the pain as I had a local anesthetic and couldn’t see with a cloth covering my face, but I could still imagine the scene. Arrgh!

I had to wait for a while as Dr Pau was still “stitching up the earlier patient”. The anesthetist was a friendly and chatty fella, who helped calming my nerve a lot. He even offered to show me Dr Pau at work, by opening the OT door and adjusted my bed towards it! Couldn’t see too clearly as I didn’t have my glasses on but still, with such close encounter, it beats watching George Cloony and Ming Na in ER and any other TV shows! What an experience.

Then, it’s my turn.

They moved me onto the surgery bed. Everyone said ‘Hi’ to me, and before I could really take a good look inside the OT, a mask was placed on my face and I was knocked out...

-hs