The day of my operation was on the 12th of July and I had a morning slot. The letter stated that the night before I could eat and drink but only up to certain times. So my last snack was at midnight whereas I was allowed to have a glass of water at 5 in the morning. God it was an early start. Having less than 5 hours sleep didn't help either. I was so excited as I knew I would soon be hearing again after 7 months of silence.
Arriving at the hospital at 7 am, people were walking around half asleep, in a almost zombie like state, but my and me mam were rather giddy as we knew this was the day everything changes. A new chapter in my life so to speak.
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| Ready for surgery! |
Shortly after that the nurse came to check my blood pressure and ask my any questions I had regarding the operation and whether I felt alright. I didn't care about the op, I was looking forward to eating afterwards. Ha-ha! Then the anaesthetist came to explain how I was going to be put asleep etc. and said that I would have to have the 'numbing' cream applied to my hand considering I was put on the children's list despite being 17. I wasn't going to argue I just wanted it to be over and done with.
The junior surgeon came to see me after the anaesthetist, explaining the procedure and that it should take roughly 4 hours. Then my main surgeon who I met at Ropewalk House told me to have both sides implanted it should be 3 1/2 hours. I was expecting around 4 so that was good or was it?
Entering the theatre prep room, the surgery team were having a team brief whilst I was being pumped with drugs to put me to sleep. I thought I should count back from 10, as that what I was told the last time I had surgery. I didn't even get to count down - knocked out!
5 and half hours later...
Finally I was out of theatre and put in recovery - it was painfully I must admit, but what do you expect when you skull has been drilled into and electrodes pushed into the Cochlear. My sight was off balance, if I moved a slight inch the whole room stated to spin. Luckily for me this only lasted a few hours. I was being dosed up on morphine and other drugs to try and numb the pain. For me this wasn't a success until the next couple of days. It was nice that my surgeon came to see me after he finished his operation list. I couldn't keep up the conversation as I kept dosing off. Ooops, I think he would understand.
After that, my mam came down to the recovery room to translate and keep me company before we were transferred to the children's ward. Thank god, they saw common sense to keep me away from the children. It was time to dose off for a while. After waking up, my mam told me that my teacher for the deaf from Ropewalk Walk came by whilst I was having my surgery and was expecting to see me but my surgery took longer than expected. So she left but gave me a present, a teddy bear with it's own cochlear attached. Sweet thought!
Around 8 o'clock I wanted to eat - it was going to be my breakfast for the day. A pack up appeared shortly after my request and it was a cheese sandwich. I shortly found out that I had no taste buds working, a risk which I knew about and the surgeon said it would come back after a while. The cheese and onion crisp tasted really funky, I could feel the texture but not taste them. Trust me it was a weird experience! .As my mouth was so dry I kept drinking fluids ,as the ward sister wouldn't let me be attached to my drip after my op. This meant I was constantly drinking water to keep hydrated as I hadn't drank anything since the early morning. The side effect of this was needed the loo in the middle of the night. My mam choose to stay with my that night, instead of going to The Ear Foundation. I didn't want to wake her in the middle of the night, but the only problem was my balance being off. I couldn't walk in a straight line with out bumping into something/one. So I decided to become inventive by grabbing onto the blood pressure monitor which was attached to wheels and used that to get myself to the opposite end of the room and back. On my way back the nurse caught me and just started laughing. I must admit I did look a bit of a state. Back to bed I went and another dose of painkillers and antibiotics.
The next morning...
The next morning I woke up rather early, simply because I couldn't get to sleep without causing so much pain by pressing on my bandage. Eventually the doctor made his rounds about dinner time to check my wounds as it kept bleeding through out the night. I got the ok, so I could go home after my X-Ray to get the all clear that the CI's were placed in the right spot.
Nearly 4 hours passed by and then I was X-Rayed but I had to wait a little while longer before I could go home.
By the time I got home, I was knacked from not having enough sleep and my siblings were bursting with questions. They wanted to see what my scars looked like and kept asking a variety of things regarding my operation. Nice to know that they care!
Later that week...
My taste buds were still funky, I couldn't taste anything till Wednesday evening and since then things have been coming back slowly. God, I missed the taste of coffee and chilli! My balance seemed to figured itself out straight away, by the Monday I could pretty much walk in a straight line with a few occasions when I wobbled.
The worst thing about having this operation was the fact you couldn't wash your hair for a week. Thank goodness for dry shampoo and even then that was horrid by the following Thursday, when I went back to the doctors for a check to make that my wounds were healing correctly. Soon as the nurse gave me the ok for washing my hair my instant reaction was 'hallelujah'!
Only 3 more weeks to the switch on I kept telling myself...
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