You may be thinking….she has LOST it!!  Or she looks very scary!  Well, one thing I have learned throughout this whole process is that your ATTITUDE effects your OUTCOME!  Friday Morning October 28th, 2011 at 6a.m. was the time I had to be at Methodist Hospital to get ready for my 12 hour surgery at 7a.m.!  Yup!  You read that right!  I was out for a NICE LONG name!  Being a mom that sleep was much anticipated even if it was under anesthesia!  On a side note my dad and Grandma Cobb had driven in from Iowa the day before to see me before my surgery and spend time with the kids on Friday while I was in surgery and Josh was at the hospital.  I knew my dad was coming when he kept calling to see if we were still at the Children’s Museum!  He was trying to surprise me!  I spent my last day pre surgery at my FAVORITE place with my kids!  It was a nice distraction to what was coming up.  Back to the day of surgery.  I had signed my life away and now it was wait time.  My Doctor came in to check on me and I had on the above glasses and teeth.  He laughed!  I didn’t see him again until the OR.  When the staff came in to take me to the OR I had on my glasses and teeth!  Anyone who has gone into the OR know you generally have nothing on but a gown!  So, as I was going down the hall everyone was laughing and I had a BIG ol smile on my face as I was headed into a long and a little scary surgery.  I’ll never forget as I was being pushed into the OR saying “Let’s get this party started!”  I was ready!  I knew whose I was and that He had gone BEFORE me!  Whatever was going to come of the surgery God had me in the palm of his hand!  I handed my glasses and teeth over while I was transferred to the table.  Once I was out the staff asked my doctor if I was always like “that?”  He said “Yup!  She doesn’t take life too seriously!”  I was glad to be able to provide some humor.  It is a delicate surgery because your bones fuse together and with all the nerves the doctor can’t go in and unscrew and take the old rods out.  They have to delicately work around your nerves and rebreak the fusion. After 10 hours of delicately taking out the old hardware, in went the THICKEST stainless steal rods, 22 screws and some cross links.  I was told it was intense getting the lower part of the rod in.  12 hours later and I am rolled out of the OR to ICU.  I was swollen and on the vent for 24 hours.  I remember waking up and my dad and grandma being in the room.  I remember asking how my kids were and if they had fun at “That Fun Place”.  They had!  Saturday morning getting extubated was the WORST thing EVER!!!!!!  You have to cough and be alert enough to help get the tube out!  I remember getting sick but not calling the nurse in because I fell back asleep and having staff come in and ask why I didn’t call them in.  I now weird things you remember!  Sunday night I was moved down to “the floor”! Before they moved me to the floor the nurse gets a bag out and says are these yours?  I was like NO WAY!!!  They had SAVED the glasses and the teeth!  I said I won’t wear the teeth because I had been sick BUT I would wear the glasses!  It brought a smile to the staff’s face!   Not a fun place to go because you wait and wait and wait to go to the bathroom and NO ONE comes!  So, I got up and went on my own!  Not supposed to do that but when you have to go you have to go!  I did not have a lot of support once I was on the floor.  I was teary.  I was tired of the hospital food.  I wanted real food!  I entertained the doctors with my ideas from thinking too much on how to improve the hospital food.  They were even thinking of doing a pot luck to cheer me up!  We didn’t end up doing that but it was nice that they thought of me!  Next week I’ll finish up with rehab and where I am today!

Post op!  Thank you JESUS for healing me!