When it rains... it pours

As if having a newborn that I don't feel bonded to, and mastitis weren't enough... my body had to throw me a fast one... a Gallbladder attack on Friday morning, say, around 2:15am!

I never even knew I had these damned gallstones... but I ended up having my entire gallbladder removed as my gallstones were huge (think golfballs) and plentiful (around 3)... I obviously had them for years and was lucky not to have more problems with them than I did have. I waited in the ER for 6 hours for the surgeon... then was moved to a room at around 8:30am... and then I waited for the surgeon for another 8 hours when all of a sudden nurses were there to take me to the operation room... yeah... I never met with the surgeon. I was never given my options. I was so out of it... I just went with the flow. When I finally did meet the ever allusive surgeon, he basically said that this was a laproscopic procedure (so there wouldn't be just one large incision... there would be lots of small ones) and I would likely be there for a day or so. I went through the surgery... and that night one of the brainiac nurses reduced my pain meds, and didn't tell me! I was crying in pain (a 8 on the pain scale) and he couldn't offer me anything for 2 more hours... it was the worst thing in the world. I woke up my sleeping hubby just to have him sit with me while I waited for those hours to tick away... I felt so lonely, so miserable, and so irritated that things just couldn't go right for me.

To make a long story not so long, the doctor wrote my discharge instructions right after the surgery saying that I was to be discharged first thing in the morning... but nobody told me. I was served breakfast and lunch. I was given my pain meds. I was told to walk and to shower. I was seen by the surgeon at 4pm who said "When she's ready to go... she's ready to go." A chaplain and a social worker showed up (but I was sound asleep both times) and when I finally woke up long enough, it was to hear that I needed to leave because I had been discharged at 8am, and that the hospital was being generous by letting me stay to that point. If I stayed any longer, I would be charged a cash bill because they couldn't bill my insurance for it. I was miserable (vomiting, nauseated, and in pain). My parents told my husband and I that they would take the baby to their house, and for us to stay over there as well so that we could be taken care of.

I couldn't believe how negative this experience was. I have to give my parents the biggest credit in the world for being there for me... they took care of the baby overnight, they changed him and held him in the hospital... and they made sure that my husband had one less thing to worry about during this whole ordeal.

One final note... this whole thing has made my distance between me and the baby a little more pronounced... I am starting to feel like he really doesn't need me... especially when he survives for 3 days without me even touching him... I know that part of that is because I planned ahead... but at the same time, it makes me feel like I am just here to feed him. My OB put me on an antidepressant to help out with this... hopefully baby and I will be a better team soon enough.

But I am tired of all these drama filled days... I hope my New Year's forecast is sunny days... no more rain!