Operations

Why is it that relatives, friends and the medical profession deem an operation such as a removal of a cyst on an ovary ‘chicken feed’ or ‘a small procedure, hardly worth mentioning in conversation’ or ‘nothing to worry about’ and even ‘a breeze, don’t be hysterical’ yet you have to go through the normal rigmarole of any operative surgery and they expect you to emerge from this fresh faced, cheerful and bouncing with positive energy?

      It is surgery after all, an invasion of the body by small metal objects with pointy fingers at the end and a pulling about of your inner bits. I didn’t think it was easy nor fun, in fact I was terrified from start to finish, no matter how small a performance it may have been for the jolly laughing surgeons and accompanying choir. There were two surgeons, an anaesthetist, six technicians monitoring the laparoscopy machines plus countless others mopping brows and other bodily parts no doubt. Doesn’t sound like a small job to me.

       I know a lot more about the recovery period of course, than of the pre-period. Though at the latter I did manage to pin the anaesthetist down as to if it was true that sometimes the surgeon thought you were unconscious but in reality you weren’t, and that you could actually feel every agonising tug, but unfortunately were rendered paralysed by the copious assortment of drugs that are shovelled in every available orifice one has, so couldn’t call out in pain.

“Hollywood has a lot to answer for,” sighed anaesthetist Mr X wearily, who did his job and shielded the barrage of questions efficiently before slinking off into the great sparking-white squeaky clean arms of the Emirates Hospital.

I know an awful lot more about the operation than I feel comfortable with too, since my gynaecologist, beaming, presented me with a DVD of the entire inner procedure. In graphic colour. [Anyone who wants a copy of this is welcome to email me on tuppy.robertson (at) gmail.com]

Then the next thing I knew they were slapping me about, getting me to wake up. Just two minutes ago they had knocked me unconscious. “Really!” I thought. “What do they want?” In reality it was 1.5 hours ago, incredible all that lost time, what had they been doing?? Anyway, I was told by a haze of faces peering down at me like Exhibit ‘A’ that all was well, it was a clean surgery (I wondered what a dirty one was), I’m in the recovery room, when ready they will move me to my private room.

“Cool.” I said.

I’m no doctor but know that the ovary is far south, yet the biggest pain was in my throat – did they remove a tonsil instead, I asked querulously? No one listened; in fact I was ignored as they put it down to post-operative drivel. But it was so sore I could hardly swallow, and when I did try water it dribbled out everywhere else rather than down the gullet.

 “Early days yet!” said the Croatian nurse breezing into the room super-efficiently. “You have some ice, yes?” which arrived in such huge icebergs I couldn’t put into my mouth no matter how hard I tried. Had to wait for it to melt. By then I had nodded off again.

You know, a hospital is possibly the only place where you can get away without worrying about the niceties of speech, just get down to the nitty gritty, and the nursing professionals get away with it.

“Have you made gas today?” asks a Filipino nurse. Wonder how she would ask Sheikha **** that question. I suspect it is fairly standard questioning from the nursing profession after most types of surgery. None of that stiff-upper British politeness here. My sister always asks: “Have you been?” if I’m looking particularly peaky on an evening. Apart from the language barrier problems we experience in Dubai’s multicultural society, I suppose it is difficult to euphemise when asking if you have farted or not. How do they ask in England?

Anyhow, I replied somewhat imperiously: “Does it matter?” Of course it matters, I discover later: if you don’t get rid of the gas I gather you will resemble a Zeppelin before too long. After all, I had just had four holes punched through my abdomen (it was to be fair, a keyhole procedure and I think the cuts were small, can’t see them yet over the fat stomach) and the body isn’t a vacuum under these circumstances.

When the dreadful pain relieving drug tramadol wore off (made me feel like a zombie) there was scope to let the mind meander about idiotically, which it did.

“Nurse, there’s an air bubble in my intravenous tube!” I’m panicked as in one episode of Scrubs I think it was, some patient starts to foam at the mouth then convulses and it is stated by a dweebie looking intern (of course), that this is due to bubbles in the intravenous tube.

“Oh – is OK!” the Thai nurse smiles brightly, and squashes the tube so the bubble reaches further towards my skin and the opening into my vein on my hand. “Is small one.”

 I think it would be advantageous to know all the ins and outs pre-operation, but there are so many small details the medical professionals wouldn’t even dream about passing on.

“You athlete?” Chinese twin nurses ask. (Well they looked the same, presumed they were twins.)

 “….er  not exactly, but I do run maybe twice a week and swim three days a week, but I wouldn’t call myself an athlete.”

 “Must be why your pulse rate so slow,” they surmise. OMG I’m dying. And BP 107 over 70? What does that mean? “Your blood pressure low but is OK,” they harmonise and giggle. Why do they giggle like that?

Rang the nurse bell to say “I’m hungry” - haven’t eaten for 24 hours. They didn’t tell me beforehand I was on a liquid diet, they just avoided bringing anything at all apart from chamomile tea. The biscuits that came with it (given I suspect as a decoy to avert me off the thought of food) were so “light” I masticated them to cement line my teeth which took an hour to clean off with the tongue and so again kept my mind off food. Ordered bangers and mash, (well she did ask what did I want, and that sounded a good option, no menu per se) but got damn tasty watery vegetable soup and full of salt, praise be. None of this hysteria about salt in food here.

 Most frustrating aspect? Having slept all day on some god-awful sleep-inducing drug I’m bright eyed and bushy tailed, yet unable to go anywhere nor do anything, least of all sleep. At 2.30am have read half my book, and needing a change of direction aimed the TV controls - yes - at the TV. No channels, apart from Little Britain. I’d rather watch the wall than suffer that utter filth. Am glad though to have summoned an Indian nurse this time (it’s like the United Nations in here), as they know a thing or two about fiddling with wires, as HRH the Duke of Edinburgh once observed. She manages to find the very first episode of Blackadder and a series of ‘Allo ‘Allo. What a pleasure! Only I forgot I shouldn’t really laugh, but the drugs coursing through my veins are covering up any pain I could be feeling. Hooray for drugs!

I was warned about the referred pain in my shoulders, something I would never have thought normal. “After keyhole surgery, you may have some pain in your abdomen and in the tips of your shoulders. The pain in your shoulders is known as referred pain and usually improves within 48 hours.” Why is it there? It’s most odd.

So roll on next Monday for the next bout of pain – the stitch removal. Could someone tell me why they don’t use dissolveable stitches?