Sick of it All

I consider myself pretty healthy. I eat well, exercise, have pretty good numbers (blood sugar, cholesterol, etc), get plenty of rest...except for a nasty abdominal hernia. I thought they were just cosmetic issues. Not quite.

In the beginning of October, I had a nasty bout of bronchitis. I had been coughing a lot, and apparently I "did" something with my hernia. I had near constant pain in my abdomen. Luckily, I have an awesome primary care physician who wanted to get this fixed. 

X rays showed nothing, which was both good and bad. I needed a CT. Off I went for that...and they found a small mass near my belly button. Next up was an ultrasound, which was inconclusive. I needed to get it biopsied.

My anxiety went off the chart over the prospect that this might be serious. I spent a lot of time in prayer, focusing on a verse from Philippians 

“Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.”

Philippians 4:6 NIV

The morning of the biopsy I was in near panic. It was the fear of the unknown. I was terrified that if it was cancer, what would happen. Would I need surgery? Additional treatment? Luckily, the Big Man is pretty pragmatic and told me there's nothing to worry about. If there was something serious, we'd deal with it then.

Following the biopsy, the good news was it was completely benign. However, I still had a lot of pain. I wound up spending a week in the hospital as they tried to pinpoint what was wrong-and how to fix it.

That brings us back to my hernia. I had a pretty massive one, and it needed to get fixed. It was incarcerated-meaning my intestines were trapped-and that was causing my pain and a low grade infection. I needed surgery.

In the meantime, I needed to clear up my infection as much as possible. Several weeks of antibiotics gave way to having surgery. Prior to it, my surgeon did not know if he could do it robotically or if he would have to open me up.

Luckily, the robot won.

It doesn't mean that it's been an easy recovery. I've got a lot of pain. I have to wear a binder, and I'm limited in what I can do physically for quite some time. I can't lift over 10 lbs-so that means grocery shopping, laundry, other chores are going to be a challenge for me. Not just immediately, but for some time to come. 

I'm so lucky that my husband & son have helped take care of me and picked up my slack. I'm focused on healing right now and just getting back to me.