Poked, prodded, sliced open, and good as new...

That's me...I've been poked, prodded, sliced open, and hopefully I'm now as good as new. What a rollercoaster week it's been..whew. Last Friday night I started to have upper abdominal pains which I originally thought were from my workout. I had been doing some heavier than normal ab workouts and figured it was just in response to that. But by Saturday afternoon the pains had gotten noticeably worse and sitting in any form of a vertical position was impossible. I spent the majority of Saturday lying on the couch in horrendous pain. JD's family celebrated Mother's Day on Saturday evening and JD and Bug went while I stayed home trying to find a position that would cause the least amount of pain for me. By Sunday morning (Mother's Day) I could no longer function and decided it was time to give in. Got dressed and headed to the ER to figure out what in the world was causing me so much pain. At this point I was still holding onto the belief that I was experiencing some major ab pain and the friendly ER doc would give me some really good muscle relaxants for my pulled muscles and send me on my merry way to celebrate Mother's Day with my family. Hehehehe oh boy was I wrong. After doing some blood tests which all came back perfectly clean he decided to do a CT scan *just in case* since nothing else was coming up as a red flag. Thank goodness he did the scan, as it was the ONLY thing that showed that I had a very large and very sick gall bladder FILLED with nasty gall stones. Imagine my surprise (and his!!) when he came into my examining room to tell me this bit of news. He immediately contacted my surgeon (since I'm so special and I have my very own personal surgeon on staff and all...yeah right) who insisted that I be admitted right away. Oh goodie. So that began my wild ride for the week. I was admitted to the hospital on Sunday evening (Happy Freakin' Mother's Day to me!!), met with my surgeon on Monday and was scheduled for surgery on Tuesday. I came out of surgery just fine...my gall bladder was in fact very large and very filled with stones. My surgeon was quite shocked that I hadn't had any attacks or symptoms up until this point based on how bad my gall bladder looked. Not sure if it's my freakishly high tolerance for pain or if I was just truly asymptomatic...in any case, everyone was surprised. I was finally allowed to eat food on Wednesday evening after three days of NOTHING. I was released to go home on Thursday and practically RAN out the hospital doors. LOL I am so sick and tired of hospitals and surgery. I realized during *this* visit to the hospital that I have been in the hospital at least once a year, every year since Bug's birth. He was born in 2003, I had surgery in 2004, 2005, 2006 (twice actually - one was minor outpatient surgery) and NOW 2007. I'm D O N E!!!! My surgeon, who has performed the last FOUR surgeries told me that I need to find another hobby because this hanging out in the hospital gig is getting pretty expensive. LOL You think? I'm so tired of surgeries, hospital stays, and recovery. Bleh... I told her I was going to take up knitting or crocheting. If it keeps me outta the damn hospital I'll do it.

JD ended up taking the week off work for various reasons and thankfully he gets a fair amount of sick time that can be used for himself or a family member. He's on vacation this coming week so that will also help a little with my recuperation but I can't say that it's been stress-free, not by a long shot!! He's been short tempered with Bug and snippy about everything. He keeps complaining that he doesn't have time to get everything done and every time Bug or I ask him something he will respond with a patented, "I'll add it to my ever growing list of things to do.." I so badly want to say, "Welcome to *MY* world!" but I've kept my mouth shut. While I appreciate his effort and willingness to pick up the slack in some cases, I hope he finally realizes how much I actually do around here. None of us are having a good time right now, Bug is stressed out because of all the changes and things that are going on. I'm stressed and struggling with trying to recuperate and deal with the pain as well as being unable to do so many of the things that I normally do without even thinking. I know he's having a hard time trying to take care of things at home as well. It's no picnic for any of us!! But hearing him whine about how tough things are for him isn't doing anything but pissing me off.

Things with Cali are ok. Last weekend we had no contact, he texted me late on Mother's Day to wish me a Happy Mother's Day but otherwise nothing. I didn't hear from him on Monday until later in the afternoon/evening and he was shocked that I was in the hospital. He seemed concerned and a bit worried about me but didn't really say much. We talked on Tuesday just before I went in for surgery and I texted him when I got out of surgery on Tuesday evening to let him know that I was alive. He was relieved to know that all went well and told me he'd call me Wed. morning. I didn't hear from him until late Wednesday night when he was on his way home from work. He was sounding really congested and when I commented about that he admitted that he was again coming down with some nasty cold or cough. I have a feeling this is a residual *thing* from when we were together. His symptoms and the way it keeps hanging on is very similar to what I dealt with throughout much of the month of April. This week was really busy for him so our contact was pretty minimal. Not a big deal since I was sort of busy recovering from surgery and didn't have a whole lot of energy to talk on the phone. I texted him Thursday when I was on my way home and he replied back to let me know that he was very happy that I was home but that he was very sick and stayed home from work. Totally uncharacteristic for him as he's such a dedicated workaholic and has to be virtually dying to skip work. He ended up home from work both Thursday and Friday and texted me both days to let me know that he was home and that he hoped I was doing better. I guess the fact that I'm more occupied with my recovery and health has caused me to let go of some of the insecurities and/or concern with keeping in touch with him. Any other time I would have been really disappointed that I didn't hear from him or get to talk to him on Thurs or Fri. but this week I wasn't at all. I figured that I'd talk to him over the weekend or the beginning of next week. In fact, I didn't even have my cell phone on (normally our primary means of communication) Friday until late in the afternoon....totally uncharacteristic for me. Honestly it didn't even occur to me that my phone was off until JD left to go get Bug and he handed it to me in case he needed to call. Really didn't matter in any case since Cali didn't even try to contact me until late that evening. The *freedom* kind of feels good...I don't feel as chained to my cell phone and I don't feel the need to sit here waiting for his call. Not that I can go anywhere at this point with my current health situation...lol...but the fact that mentally and emotionally I'm feeling a bit stronger is kind of nice and refreshing.

The whole separation thing is sort of on the back burner at this point as we get through my recovery and the next week or so. I guess we'll end up having to have that *talk* again in a few weeks once everything is cleared up and I'm back to work and life is back to normal. Right now I don't have the energy to revisit it...especially since we *just* discussed it the week before I landed in the hospital. One step at a time.

Well I need to get Bug ready for bed...today feels so much like a Sunday even though it's Saturday. I'll have more soon...