4 Days Out

[powerworx]

So last Thursday I had my surgery. New On-X valve. on the aorta.

Surgery went longer than expected. Significant leaking made my surgeon spend more time on it bringing time of surgery to 9 hours.

I'll hopefully have more time for some extra details later, but I'm wondering if anyone else had issues with insomnia? I have been up every night since. Even taking pain meds, and tonight I was given sleeping pills and I still can't sleep. The best I've gotten is a couple hours of naps in the afternoon,

Anyone have any advice. or something that worked?

 

[pellicle]

Hey and welcome to this side of surgery

If insomnia is in hospital , then I'm not surprised. I had dreadful sleep in the ward.

It's all topsy turvy just after surgery, give it time and it'll re establish a again (sleep patterns)

 

[FredW]

My experience was that sleeping was a problem for about a week after surgery. It helps to sleep when you can. It will get better, but not until you get home.

Welcome to the other side.

 

[cldlhd]

I didn't sleep well for awhile after, it'll settle out.

 

[powerworx]

So some more details. Surgery went long as mentioned above and apparently I lost a lot of blood. Since then the major issues I've had were dealing with pain management, sleep and blood pressure. I was unprepared for the amount of pain that I would experience. It sounds like my results have not been normal.

Nightly (3 out of the last 4 nights) at 3-4am I wake up with my pain off the charts, groaning uncontrollably, shallow breathing and sweating profusely and my blood pressure super high (175+/90). It has been frustrating trying to explain that pain medication wearing off quickly on me has been a lifelong thing. After 3 nights of everyone promising me they were going to deal with it, the solution seems to be to reduce medication and give it more regularly.

They have been struggling to get my blood pressure to stay down, even thought the consensus is that it could be mostly pain related.

I'm currently sitting with blood pressure at 175/99 and pretty lousy pain and weird chest feelings.

Help! Anyone have any similar experience?

 

[pellicle]

Sadly there is nothing we here on the other side of the screen can do to help you except say that this doesn't sound normal and that you should be bringing this up with the nursing staff and doctors.

I hope things improve soon...

Best Wishes

 

[almost_hectic]

I had a terrible time sleeping in the hospital. Between pain and pain meds I had all kinds of bizarre dreams of being awake. So much so that throughout the night I couldn't tell when I actually was awake or dreaming. My surgeon had me on a cocktail of different pain meds and I can't recall exactly what they were at which points but besides the narcotic pain meds I do know an added effort he made was to use intravenous liquid Tylenol. I had never heard of it before but it's a technique it sounded like was uniquely his own.

 

[Agian]

It's a strange time. I used to slip in and out of sleep in hospital; very restless. I did some strange things. Soon after I got home, I rang up the hospital in the middle of the night demanding to know why they only shaved one armpit. You'll be ok. Chin up.

 

[neil]

take care and rest up, good luck

 

[matty]

Hi,

This option has probably already been explored, but for me when I was in ICU and soon thereafter, IV Fentanyl was the only thing that really helped with pain.... because it reliably put me to sleep. As soon as I woke up I would hit my delivery button three times in 30 minutes (or whatever the max dosage was) and I knew I would be asleep 5 minutes after the third button press. I carried this on for about three days which got me through the worst of the pain. You're a bit further out than me, but all the best.

 

[Eva]

Powerworks,

Glad to hear all went well. Insomnia will resolve itself on its own with time. Such a surgery is hard to digest even though all went well. Try to rest when you can and it's ok to take anxiety or sleeping pills for a short time until your body/mind get over the shock your body/heart went through.

Keep us posted.

 

[powerworx]

So far this seems to be a pretty tough recovery. They aren't going to let me go home until my blood pressure gets under control (makes sense) and my INR is really moving slow.

Days 3-5 I was having minor hallucinations. Seeing bugs/moths/etc out of the corner of my eyes a lot. Been a strange road. My.pain is finally starting to go down a bit. We moved to a more frequent lower dose medication and it seems to have really helped. My only out take so far is that I'm really glad I went mechanical. I don't ever want to do this again.

 

[pellicle]

Glad they found something that's helping

I don't want to recall the nightmares I had both times

 

[Agian]

Days 3-5 I was having minor hallucinations. Seeing bugs/moths/etc out of the corner of my eyes a lot.

Sounds like ICU. How do you know they were hallucinations?

 

[honeybunny]

I didn't have much of an issue with pain oddly enough but sleeping was another matter. I bought an electric recliner to help with that but still had difficulty sleeping more than a few hours, even with a sleeping/anxiety pill. Can't remember how long it took me to move back to the bed but it was several weeks.

You can also scroll through the post-surgery forum and look for post titles dealing with pain.

Wishing you the best.

 

[drivetopless]

Sounds like you are slowly improving. The first 2 weeks was the worst. It gets better. Hang in there!!!

 

[Eva]

Yes, hang in there! The worst is almost over! From now on you'll start seeing improvement every day.
I had very strange dreams and many nightmares the first few nights! Yet, I enjoyed the strange dreams (he he he) I lived in another world which seemed very beatiful! Wish I had written them down. It's nice, if you can, to keep a journal and see your progression.
Good luck. Keep us posted.

 

[powerworx]

Last night I had another lousy night. Bad stomach pain maybe from something I ate combined with the other pain almost made everything unbearable.

Then my nose started squirting blood. While trying to get it under control it started running into my stomach and I started vomiting and dry heaving.

At that point they pulled my labs and called the doctor. I was removed from my heparin drip temporary until I stopped bleeding. My blood pressure was taken and it was 195/105. 20 minutes later and the nose is good. Labs come back and my INR is good and the heparin doesn't need restarted.

Finally took a nap around 8am.

Got up and started moving around about 10am. Felt pretty good. BP is down to 155/90. Rest a little. Blood pressure drops to 135/85.

I've felt really good the rest of today. Walked about a mile. Pain is almost gone. Blood pressure has continued to drop. All my nurses seem shocked.

So weird. Probably going home tomorrow. Thanks for listening to my tirade and giving input. It's been a really scary, not fun adventure.

 

[pellicle]

****
That's no fun at all

Perhaps exacerbated by the nose tube removal?

I hope things smooth out for you soon

Best Wishes

 

[Agian]

I enjoyed the strange dreams (he he he) I lived in another world which seemed very beatiful.

Really? Do tell us more.