Wow Penny that's rough... Sorry... They always have trouble finding veins in me, so I've had a few bruises recently (have two on the back of my hand right now in fact) and the one from my angio took forever to go away. But none of mine have been quite THAT bad! But it'll get better - will just take some time. Sorry about the male nurse... It was a male nurse that took out my bladder catheter. Maybe we should start a petitition against male nurses
Just kidding, some of 'em are good.
Angel, you are so, so right! The people in here are just unbelievable! And I felt/feel the exact same way - I don't know how I could have gotten through this w/o this forum. As you get closer to surgery, I wouldn't be surprised if you need the anti-anxiety stuff even less. There seems to be a weird "at peace" feeling that comes on in the last couple days (i've heard others describe it, and I know I had it). It's like - well, there's no turning back now, so might as well just go with the flow. The night before surgery, when I was doing all the prep - which by the way is just a blast - just you wait, lol, I remember thinking, wow, 24 hrs from now, the surgery will be overwith, and I'll be awake in the hospital room. I thought I'd get more nervous in those last few hrs, but actually got less so.
Here's one other 'trick' that worked for me, and I think both of you should try it. In coaching sports, we teach kids to 'visualize success'. That means, see yourself hitting the ball, or catching the ball, or whatever the sport is. If you can see it in your head, you can usually make it happen. Well, it worked for me before surgery too. I'd start visualizing myself 6 months or a year after surgery, living a normal life (in fact, better than I'd lived in years because of my symptoms the last couple years). I'd recommend you try the same thing - the mind is a powerful tool!!! So visualize yourself doing something you want to do 6 months from now, or a year from now. If you can see it - it should give you more confidence that it really is going to happen. Hope that makes sense - it sure worked for me! Now you two kids hold hands, and get each other through this together
We'll all be here too of course, rooting you on, praying for you, talking you through it, etc, etc.
Oh, and everyone remember to think some positive thoughts for Heartman77 (Mike). He had his surgery this morning I believe (a Wed. again, lol). And I suspect we'll be hearing from him before the weekend, or at least by early next week. And I'll bet he says the same thing Malibu just said (and I said, and Gil (LuckyGuy) said, and... list goes on and on)... Which is - it's really nowhere near as bad as I feared.