My Story: Having Scoliosis Surgery
On June 3rd, 1999, I went to see Dr. Fitch at Duke to see what we needed to do about my back. We knew it had gotten worse, just not 10 degrees in less than a year. The news was obvious. It was time for the surgery. I had been expecting it, so it was no surprise to me. The same was true with my parents.
We scheduled the surgery for September 27th. I was ready for it. I think that one thing that made me say “yes” was that six days after we scheduled my surgery, my friend from school, Melissa, was to have the same surgery.
Pre-Op Day
September 3rd came. This was my pre-operative exam. Before I had the actual exam, I had to get the evoked potential screening done. It was much easier than I was expecting. My parents and I waited for a good number of minutes before we went into the lab. Once we got in, they were kind enough to give me a Valium to relax me some. Then they started putting all the electrodes all over me, starting with my head, then down my back, then knees, finally feet. Finally, the technician plugged me into the computer and had me lay down on the bed. Let me just say that that was a very comfortable bed. J
Once lying down, they started sending small electrical pulses through my feet. It didn’t hurt at all; in fact it felt kind of good. The electrical pulses made my foot jump and sent a signal to my brain to get a reading of how well my spinal cord was working. They told me that they would do this during the surgery and compare the one that they did pre-operatively to the one during surgery to make sure they didn’t pinch the cord and cause problems. They recorded the information, and it was time for me to go. I didn’t want to go though; that bed was just too comfortable.
Once I was done there, we had to go to Duke South to go through my pre-op exam. This wasn’t anything new to me after all my surgery, so it wasn’t all that bad. Most people compare it to a physical you would have at your regular doctor. Anyway, we got to the Pre-Op Screening Clinic on the 2nd floor of South. My mom went to the receptionist and got a clipboard with 4 pages on it. This was for all the medical history. Tons of questions were on it, and some were more difficult than others.
A nurse came out only after a few minutes to get me to come back. She was so quick that my mom didn’t even have time to start the medical history! The nurse took me into a small side room and had me sit down in a chair. Here, she took my temperature, weight, height, blood pressure, and pulse ox (the little clip on your finger). All that was perfect so she sent me to the exam room for the doctor to come in.
We waited in the exam room for several minutes and finally the doctor came in. He said hello and checked over my history, which my mom filled out by now. He then talked about how they would use the IV to put me to sleep, and a few other things about the anesthesia. He then did the usual physical like things by checking my eyes, ears, reflexes, heartbeat, breathing, etc… Once he determined that everything was ok, he asked if there were any questions and sent me down to the lab room to get my blood drawn.
My parents and I sat out in some chairs right outside the lab. I don’t know if it was me or that Valium from the Evoked Potential talking, but I was ready to get the blood drawn. Pretty soon, the technician called me back and had me sit in the special chair, which had big, wide arms for your arms to sit in. She was a very sweet lady who was very concerned that I was comfortable. She got all the needles and test tubes she needed and then sat down next to me. She asked me which arm she should use and I said that she could choose. She looked at them and said, “Wow boy! You’ve really gotten this done a lot!” She put the tunicate on my left arm and cleaned off my vein with an alcohol pad. Finally, the time came that she put the needle in. It was just like a little sting. It was nothing too bad at all. Shots hurt worse than that did. The technician said, “Wow, I must have done something wrong. You didn’t scream.” After taking 4 tubes of blood, she pulled the needle out, bandaged me up, and sent me out in the hallway again to wait.
The person came from Child-Life to tell us about the surgery. She took my family and I into an office to talk about what would happen. She was very informative, but I had a lot more experience with surgery than she did, so I knew most of the stuff. She went over what would happen when I would get put to sleep, everything that would happen before I went to the operating room, and what it would be like when I wake up. She asked if there were any questions, and gave us some resources to look at about what was going to happen. We thanked her and went home. That ended a very productive day at Duke.
More Trips to the Hospital
Dr. Fitch had told me that I needed 2 units of my own blood for the surgery. For this, I had to go to our local hospital to have the units taken from me. The 2 days were one week apart and took about 45 minutes. Nothing with that was too major at all; both went ok.
After all the blood work to get my own blood to use for my surgery (as well as one from each parent), it was just a matter of time to wait the 2 weeks until the surgery. September 27th was drawing near.
The Day Has Come
My surgery was scheduled for 8:30 in the morning. Since we live about 90 minutes away from my hospital, we spent the night before at the small hotel across the street from the hospital. We got there at about 7am. My parents were a nervous wreck, I was pretty much fine with it the whole time. I tried to comfort my parents some, but my efforts were not very successful.
We did have one problem at check in. No one was really sure what time my surgery was at. One place said 8:30 and another said 10:30. The confusion continued until I went to sleep; this is just not very common, but interesting.
The nurse came into the pre-op check in waiting area and called my name. She said to follow the little blue signs to the dressing room. There are a ton of them! Anyway, we got into the dressing room, which was just what the name implies, a dressing room with a lot of stalls to change in. I went in there and got everything changed into the gown, socks, and hairnet. They told me to go to the bathroom quick before going to pre-op since it would be the last time in a while I would be able to go by myself easily. It was pretty much true.
After the bathroom stop, I went with my parents and the nurse directly across the hall to pre-op holding (the big place where the nurses prep you for surgery). I got Bed 10. (Isn’t kind of interesting that I remember stuff like that?) Well, then the nurse came over and took all my vital signs like pulse, breathing, blood pressure and temperature. Once all that was in order, it was time for the “pokey lady” to come.
The one nurse came over and told me it was time for my IV. I was expecting it obviously, and I was a little nervous when it came to the pain. This time though I did have a wonderful nurse. She put the tourniquet on and found the vein in my right hand. She then gave a small shot there to numb it first (something I had not had with any of my other surgeries). While that was working, she talked to me and made me feel a lot more comfortable and just feel like I can trust her. She was also drawing some blood out of my hand too, but my body evidently didn’t want to cooperate much since she couldn’t get much out. After about 3 minutes or so, she came back with the IV needle and went to put it in. Surprisingly to me, it didn’t hurt at all. It was much better than any other one I have ever had. They hooked it to the solution and taped it down. Now I was almost ready to go back.
My parents were signing the proper forms when the anesthesiologist came in. He was, much to my surprise, VERY German. He told me what would happen when I went back, and asked if I had any questions before going back. Finally, right before he and his resident left, they told me I had to think of a joke to tell them. As for me, I am terrible at jokes so I only had one really corny one.
It was time to go back. The anesthesia resident came and took me back. I said bye to my mom, and my dad went back with me (which I was surprised of also). He pulled me down the hall and through the big double doors which had “Restricted Area” printed on them in big red letters. We went down the hall a little when we made a left turn to go down and into this room. I thought it was the OR, but, somehow, I was able to read the sign that said it was the pediatric induction room.
I was rolled in there and the doctor pulled me back by all the equipment. There were about 4 other people already in there, one being Tish, Dr. Fitch’s nurse. The anesthesiologist started putting the electrodes on my chest for the heart monitor, the clip on my finger for the pulse ox, and a blood pressure cuff for the obvious, taking my blood pressure. Next, I remember the monitors start beeping like crazy, which I was happy for. It made me figure out that I was alive. J
The doctor then just put the mask down on my face. The smell of the sleepy gas was familiar to me so I defiantly noticed it when it started coming at me. He just told me to relax and try to keep my eyes open. Pretty soon, I started feeling really dizzy. I felt like I was about to fall off the back of the bed. As soon as I could say to myself, “Hey, I am dizzy!” I was asleep. It just went completely black for, what seemed to me, as about 3 minutes.
First Days of Being a Boy with Metallic Attachments
When I woke up, I had my usual thoughts of “Where am I?” It was weird at first because I had no real sight at first; I could just hear gurgling and some people telling me to cough. Pretty soon, a real blurry sight of me being put into my bed in PICU came to me and I remembered where I was and what all had just happened.
The resident of Dr. Fitch came in and checked my reflexes and movements and fun stuff like that. They had told be before that it would be about 45 to 90 minutes after I woke up that my parents could come back to see me. I was surprised to see how fast time went by when I was actually in there. It seemed only like 15 minutes, but lets just say I was way out of it by then. When they came back, I said some pretty weird stuff. I remember the first thing I asked was if I had the catheter in. When they said, “Yes. Why?” I just said, “Good, I have to goooooo!”
Meanwhile, it was getting late. Actually, it was just getting later. I thought it was like 3AM, but it turned out to be about 5PM. My parents were beside me most of the time and found me talking to them for about a total of 5 minutes, then having me tell them that I was going to fall asleep, and promptly followed my order. I had my dad rubbing my foot most of the time; it was the only place that really didn’t hurt or have something stuck in. To total, I had only 2 IV’s when I woke up, which was less than I was expecting.
Pretty soon, 9 o’clock came and visiting hours were paused for rounds. My parents decided not to come back and just get some sleep until morning. Meanwhile, in my opinion, the most interesting things happened.
The Night of the Falling Nurses
It was about 9:45, and the nurses were being very kind and helpful. They were constantly checking to see if I needed anything or if I was ok. I still, to this day, thank them for their hard work and their kind attitudes since I know I am not a good patient when I am waking up from anesthesia. Pretty soon, the weird stuff started happening.
First thing that started happening was that the monitor was going off. It was saying I wasn’t breathing. However, since I was still alive and still breathing, I knew that this was most likely incorrect. Next, my most humorous thing happened. My parents had told the nurses that I usually go to sleep with the TV on, so they brought a TV in for me. (Nice Nurses!) There was a problem though; the cable jack and the outlet were on the ceiling. So the nurse climbed on the end of my bed to plug it in. Next thing I know, I remember her laying on the floor with all the other nurses standing over her. She fell off my bed when she was trying to plug the stuff in. The last thing that happened I am sure was most likely morphine induced. They got the TV on and working with no more injuries. It was around 11pm since the Channel 5 news was on. Evidently, the news was talking about flooding followed by the sports scores since I started thinking about Harvard and flooding. I then happened to say, “How’s Harvard during the flooding season?” The nurse just looked at me weird. I followed up by saying, “Never Mind, it’s the morphine.”
Morning came and I really didn’t notice it really. My parents came back and told me they were just about ready to move me to my own room. In fact there was a bed in the hall for me with my name on it. When the nurses came to take me, they said that they weren’t going to even try to move me just so it would be less stressful on my back, so they took me in the nice, hi-tech, not supposed to leave the PICU bed. So down the hall I went to my new home for 4 days.
Justin’s Room
I got to my room and didn’t feel the best in the world, but I was just glad to have a little more privacy. The room was very nice. It had a refrigerator, a TV and VCR, a bathroom, all the conveniences of home all in one. The first thing I had to find was the remote, and I did. Found all the good stations and left the TV on all week.
Pretty soon, I got a visitor I really did not want to meet, and was probably my least favorite person there, the teacher. I’m sorry, but a day after back surgery is not a time you really want to learn. She came in on Wednesday and Thursday. What fun. Oh well, she had to do it sometime I guess.
The nurses, who were as nice as the ones in PICU, came in every 2 hours or so to check on me. They were so nice and very cheerful. When they came in, they would check my IVs, take my pulse, temperature, and blood pressure. After they took me off the morphine, they came in to give me all the pain pills. Fun Fun.
The night of the second day was pretty much the same as the first. I did get the catheter out which was helpful. By the 3rd day, they had plans of getting me up and around to walk for the first time after the surgery. This, I wasn’t looking too forward to. I knew it was going to hurt and all, so it was not a top priority. The teacher did come in and did an activity on state capitals. Surprisingly, I got them all right. That’s pretty good to get all those right while on a hospital grade narcotic. They also came in and disconnected my second IV and just left the catheter in there to use as a spare. Dr. Fitch came in to see me a little bit, and told me to stay laying flat for one more day. That just killed me, but I dealt with it.
The 4th day came now. This was a very interesting day. The teacher came back in and did bones today. That wasn’t a good topic for me at that point, but I was in kind of a bad mood. The major thing was that they let me sit up for the first time in 4 days. That really was a joy since I have a bad stomach as it is. There was one condition with that however. I had to walk too.
Walking to The Purple Tile
The physical therapy lady came in that afternoon and told me the plan. I would walk down the hallway with the help of a walker. Boy, I thought, it won’t be as bad as I thought. They helped me to the end of the bed and showed me how to get out of bed (since I couldn’t just get up like normal). They had me roll over on my side, and then my mom and the PT lady helped me sit up sideways. Once I was sitting up, they let me sit up just to try to regain my balance. After about 2 minutes, I was ready to go.
The physical therapy lady and my mom pulled me up, and I staggered up. I was standing! I was rather proud of that. The lady then told me to just go out the hall and walk down to the nurses’ station and then come back to the room. I got out there and walked pretty slowly. Everything worked pretty well except that I ran into the wall. That was kind of weird because I couldn’t back up due to the walker. So the nurse came and pulled me off the wall. I returned to my room and promptly got back into bed where I fell asleep.
Home Again, Naturally
October 2nd was now here. For the first time since the surgery, my stomach actually felt like eating something, so I ate one of those good blueberry muffins they had given me. I even was able to walk to the chair pretty much by myself. The resident came in and said I looked pretty good and that going home was up to me. He said that if I felt good enough to go home, I could go today. Otherwise, I could stay as long as I felt like I needed to stay. Well, my brain, seeing that I had eaten for the first time and felt relatively decent decided that I was ready to go home.
The nurse came in with the discharge papers and had my mom sign them. Pretty soon, the person with the wheelchair came to take me to the car. We put a pillow behind me, and I said good-bye to my room. We went down to the 1st floor lobby and out the big front doors to the car that Dad had driven up. I got in and on our way home.
Getting home was not the best experience, with potholes and detours. Still, getting home was a good feeling to know that the main hurdle was over. Even with the pain of surgery, I was thinking to myself the whole time, it was worth it. To this day, I still think that way.
THE END
