DH's Surgery Update

So here's the latest on my DH's health. First though I have to thank every single one of my wonderful friends for their supportive emails and phone calls. It made all the difference. You girls are the best.

Well, it was supposed to be a minor surgery, like most endoscopic surgeries. But because of the many layers of fat in my DH's middle, they couldn't proceed endoscopically and had to revert to old-fashioned surgery, which changed everything. First of all, it became a major abdomen surgery. Then as soon as they'd started, they were faced with the first complication. My DH's spleen was so huge with fat that it made any kind of work on that area impossible. So they had to do a splenectomy, a major procedure in itself. The first problem with splenectomy is patients become highly vulnerable to any infection. Another problem is collapse of the lungs, which took two days to announce its arrival. My DH was given breathing exercises and strictly warned that if he didn't give it his all the lung collapse would soon give way to pneumonia. Problem is he can't give it his all because breathing in itself hurts him badly.

You know I wasn't able to stay with him at the hospital because of my toddler, and you were all right on the money. It was impossible to even visit quietly in her presence. My consolation was that she took to sleeping all afternoon in her stroller and that my mom babysat all morning, so I was free to help DH around when he had to start trying to take baby steps. I was wrong. Turns out because I was crying my eyes out during his surgery and thinking all the bad thoughts there are in the world (it was supposed to take 2 hours but took 6 instead), I got sick. Toward the end of the second day it became evident I was very, very sick and very, very contagious. Not something to shrug off considering DH's splenectomy. So I was ordered to stay away from him and wear a mask. Soon my toddler caught my flu and then my sister-in-law. At this point we were still spending the night at my new place, unable to cook ourselves anything or wake up in time for our medicines or entertain my DD or anything except getting dressed (in my case trying to smooth out any wrinkles in the jeans and top I fell asleep in) and dashing out to the hospital. So before yesterday my SIL decided it would take us forever to get well like this and decided to go back to their place which is very far from mine and the hospital, while I went back to my mom's. That way she reasoned that she would have a chance to rest and that my mom would help me out.


Tomorrow morning my DH is leaving the hospital for our new place with his mom, only neither my SIL nor I can join them. Because splenectomy makes patients dangerously vulnerable to any infection, we can't stay in the same place he's in unless we're 100% OK. So tomorrow I'm going to drive him, wearing the mask, drop him off at our place and head back to my mom's.

Some of you are probably wondering why my mom hasn't helped out more. Those who know her personally can probably answer better than I can, but I'll try... Suffice it to say that she has been working her fingers to the bone making my DH soft foods that go with his new soft diet, and at the same time keeping house for 6 messy people, babysitting a hyperenergetic toddler, tutoring my 13-year-old brother who is taking his end-of-year exams, all while suffering from a very painful condition in both her legs and getting no sleep because my sister leaves for work at 2:30am and my mom insists on staying up in case my sister needed to iron her clothes or find a pair of shoes that's disappeared or anything like that... God bless my mother.


It's going to be tough for my DH and MIL to get oriented with a new place under these conditions but my DH's surgeon chose our place instead of my MIL's because it's much much closer to his private practice and the hospital. Won't be easy though -- I mean a recuperating husband who is cared for by his exhausted mother with nobody else to help out because we're all sick... It's a huge blow to be 32 and be told that you're gonna be treated like...I don't know... HIV patients, shielded from everything because infection is not a simple matter. I still can't imagine how I'm gonna just ferry him from the hospital to the apartment like I'm just one of his good friends... Please don't get me wrong, everybody. I'm immensely grateful for everything. It's just this new turn of events that I'm having a hard time coming to terms with. At least I'll get to see him and drive him. His poor sister won't even see him until she's fine.

Thanks again everybody for all your support, and thanks Ghiwa for your unexpected email that really, really brightened my day. Keep us in your prayers.

DH's Surgery

I was wondering if anyone can help me with this. My DH is having surgery on Wednesday. Thank God it's nothing major; it's an endoscopic surgery actually and we're hoping nothing comes up during the surgery that would require shifting to old-fashioned surgery. Anyway, he's expected to stay in the hospital for 2-3 days then go home for perhaps 7-10 days recuperation. He has severe acid reflux that has become life-threatening -- often he wakes up in the middle of the night almost choking, coughing and spluttering, because the reflux shot all the way up to his nose and came out of it. Plus long-term reflux paves the way for cancer in the oesophagus.

My question is do you ladies think that, with my active 18-month-old DD, I can stay with him at the hospital. Someone's gonna stay with him, and his mom and my parents insist it's impossible with DD and that he's better off with his mom at his side. My dad says my presence might even be a hindrance because he may need something and find that I'm breastfeeding DD or rocking her or running after her if she runs out the door or trying to get her to stay quiet at the middle of the night while she wants to be up and play... Which is another thing my dad mentioned: That other patients including my DH may be disturbed by her noise.

I just can't believe I won't be there for him! I know his mom wants to be with him... I mean she even insists that we should spend recuperation at her place so she can fix him all the special meals after surgery (he won't be able to have anything except liquids and semiliquids) . I offered having her and his sister (who lives with her) over at our place but she refused. I sort of can't blame her now that I'm a mother, but you know... I mean I'm his wife and everything and it's killing me that I'm gonna be just like anyone else who comes to visit him and leaves...

Leaving my DD somewhere is not an option: She's still breastfeeding, my mom's swamped with urgent undelayable stuff at her place, there's no one else I can leave her with.

I'm rambling. I do that. Sorry. My question is has anyone been there? I mean is it really impossible to stay at the hospital with a toddler? I was even thinking of buying her one of those playground things or toyhouses and putting it in the room, but I don't know... I don't even know if I can afford it, plus she may get bored...

I'd be very grateful for your ideas on this one. And would you keep us in your prayers? Thanks everybody.