Now I have an USB

My procedure was not until 2 PM I took a Xanax that I was hoping would knock me out until at least 10 AM thursday morning, and I stuffed myself with food until 12 AM the night before since they wanted me to stop eating/drinking then. (food is extremely important to me and I simply admire the people who say that they forgot to eat anything after breakfast till dinner remembering my mastectomy day and how I was about to climb the walls around 11 AM cause I was hungry I was not looking forward to another tummy grumbling episode !)

After I woke up in the morning put on my eye covers and buried my head under the pillows getting ready to continue sleeping then heard the phone ring, it was the hospital asking me to come asap cause the surgeon was running ahead of schedule. We got to the hospital quickly ( was half asleep luckily my mom was driving) did the paperwork. They were giving out donuts in the waiting room - Now here is something that I have a hard time grasping, I understand that donuts, bread are all comfort foods but c'mon they should not be serving this kind of crap at least at hospitals. It is like ' oh yeah.. lets clog your arteries up with lard and then get boatload of your $$ unclogging your vascular plumbing'

In the meantime I was trying to reach Group#1 oncologist unsuccessfully to let them know that I was not coming for the chemo treatment on Friday. All I was getting was the annoying ' All of our agents are busy, please wait for the next available ... ' I was not even given the option to leave a voice mail. I called the generic oncology scheduling line and canceled my appointment but I still had to talk to the oncologists nurse since I knew that they really had to pull some serious strings to squeeze me in. After at least 20 minutes on the phone and trying 3 different phone numbers I was able to reach a voice mail box from another department transferring my call internally. Stated that I would not be coming in for the appointment on Friday cause I still was not sure on whether I preferred dose dense or conventional chemo and my surgery site had not healed.. and I would call them later to reschedule.

After some amount of wait I got into the pre-op room of Dr. Phillips hospital. The pre-op room was a lot nicer than the other one I had they gave me an insulated gown which was hooked up to a hose blowing in warm air.. that really felt cozy. The nurse taking care of me, Lar was from Sweden and we chatted about Sweden since I had went to Sater for the Triathlon ITU Worlds Long Distance Race in 2004. Dr. Chambers came (she is the surgeon who had also done my mastectomy) and we discussed the action plans for the 3 oncologists which really did not differ that much although she did not outwardly state so I understood that she agreed with my present selection of Oncologist. She took the time to explain the procedure of placing the port on my left side and checked my mastectomy incisions.

( It is funny that the 2 oncologists that I was trying to decide between were featured in October 2006 version of the Doctor Magazine .)

At least 6 people asked me the same questions over and over again ( main nurse, surgery nurse, anaesthesiologist, asst. anaesthesio..., ) my name, dob, what operation I was having. This is good that will make sure that I do not end up having my apendicitis removed.

They had a bit of problem sedating me..injected me with Versed ? Then Lar kept coming back asking ' are you still awake we might need a sledgehammer to knock you out ' I felt more awake than I had walked in the effect of Xanax wearing off. They gave me another dose but that did not make me drowsy either, maked the surgery nurse promise to make sure that I was not awake 'during' surgery ! Finally they gave up trying to knock me out and gave an Entertainment Weekly to keep me busy for a while. Then they wheeled me into the surgery room, boy the corridors of the surgery place were sooo crowded with hi-tech gadgets it looked more like a warehouse. The surgery room was more professional than the one that I had the mastectomy in but could not see the stereo. So I asked where the stereo was.. they put on 'Hotel California' .. thats the last thing I remember. I wish getting sedated would be gradual for me it is more like 'poof' I go out.

Woke up in the post-op room and did not feel drowsy at all they must have done a really good job. We started chatting with the nurse ( forgot his name) who said that they only had to wait for my x-ray to come back that would show that the port was in place and they did not puncture my lung ( WTF !!!! ) which could possibly happen in port placement surgery. I immediately started a self check by breathing in deeply and stated that I would probably be able to tell if I had a hole in my lung .. right ???

Sucked on some ice then we had to wait forever for the radiology department until one of the nurses just walked over there and forced them to give an answer ( the joke was that you do not want a little blond Texan girl on your back :o) )

Finally I was given clear to go ahead.

Got wheeled to another suite where I would be discharged from, picked up my mom from the waiting room. Gobbled down the crackers and juice they gave me and I was out of there feeling perfectly fine even felt that I could drive.

The ports that I had seen on other gals were a lot less invisible than mine, is it the swelling .. or.. maybe I actually do not have any fat in my chest area the port is kind of sticking out. Here is a bit info on ports

Came home and felt a bit discomfort since the thing feels like it is sitting on my bone.. so took 2 tylenols and had a big breakfast, Elif made awesome pancakes for me.. watched Greys Anatomy. The new season is starting at the perfect time although I wanted to kind of catchup with Losts 3rd season which is not released yet from abc.com read a bit and took a nap.

The oncology nurse had left voice mails to the home and my cell phone asking for an explanation on why I was cancelling and that she would not be able to reschedule me for next week since their schedule was really tight. I called back and was able to leave another voicemail confirming that I was aware of their scheduling problems but I would NOT be coming in friday and I would call them later.

Did some online shopping with the help of my resident fashion advisor( that would be Elif my little one - aka version 2.0) from TLC then took a hydrocodone to sleep well and not feel any discomfort from the incision site.