surgery and an interesting morning

[Guest guest]

as you can see, I am very behind on my mail. The surgeon's office called me

Tuesday morning and told me they wanted me admitted that afternoon for my

surgery on Thursday. They wanted to monitor my clotting time. They were afraid

to just stop the coumadin without monitoring me. My internal med doc told the

surgeon that I was just the type patient that would be very likely to end up

with a blood clot if they just stopped the coumadin without watching me. I had

the hernia surgery on Thursday. All went well, but I think I must be getting

old or something. I swear this surgery hurt just as much, if not more than the

hernia repair I had in December. Hopefully I am through with surgery for a long

while!

I'l probably have to delete a lot of messages as I have 225 unread messages.

Oh, I had a very interesting morning this morning. I fell asleep in the

recliner about 3 a.m. Right at 7, I woke up with this horrendous burning in my

esophagus. I could barely breathe. I could not even move in the recliner

because I had no strength. I could barely talk but somehow I managed to make

enough sound to get my husband's attention. He came running and helped me sit

up in the recliner. I was able to breath just a tad bit better once I was no

longer lying down. However, my throat was on fire and every breath was

extremely difficult. I managed to get enough sound out to tell my husband to

call 911. I could hear and feel a very large rattle in my chest. I am pretty

sure I threw up a little and ended up having it go down my windpipe. I coughed

up some but not nearly enough because coughing was horrendously painful on both

my throat and my belly. Luckily we live just minutes from the hospital, so the

ambulance was at the house in less than 5 minutes. they had me in the hospital

in about 10 minutes. My O2 sat rate was 88 on room air and it went up to 90-93

on oxygen. They did blood work, a chest x-ray, and gave me a breathing

treatment with albuterol. When they began the albuterol, my O2 sat was down to

about 89 even with oxygen. As soon as they started the albuterol, it went up to

98 and 99. After the treatment, my lungs both felt and sounded much better.

They put me on keflex and an albuterol inhaler 4 times a day and told me to

follow up with my doc on Tuesday. They told me if things got worse again to get

right back to the ER. He said I had already developed a pretty good case of

acute bronchitis and it wouldn't take much for it to progress to pneumonia.

This was probably one of the most scary things I've ever gone through. I rarely

have upper respiratory problems. Feeling as though each breath might be your

last was a horrible feeling. Not to mention how friggin bad the back of my

throat/esophagus felt (still hurts pretty bad right now).

Anyway, I'm almost afraid to go to sleep because I have no clue what caused me

to throw up in my sleep!

W

[Guest guest]

,

I'm glad the surgery went well, though I'm sorry you've got bronchitis.

I know how you feel about the not being able to breathe. I had pnuemonia

two years ago and man was it nasty! I hope you get over the bronchitis

soon. Hope you feel better soon too!

Kimber

--

Kimber

Vallejo, CA

hominid2@...

Note: All advice given is personal opinion, not equal to that of a licensed

physician or health care professional.