John is Home!, Heidi's Surgery, New Job

John is Home!

He was finally able to come home on the 5th of March! And he was able to resume his normal diet (per his doctor). In fact, he had a pizza that evening that my sister-in-law made especially for him. He's been eating Butterfingers (baby size) on a regular basis. Reason being that he's so so thin! He's 167 lbs, but looks even less! He does not like being thin...We are still at Mom's and Simon's home. My brother, his wife and their kids are staying there, as well. They, and the kids are living down in the basement apartment, until my brother finishes is clinical rotations and taking his big test. In June they will move to Oregon, where he will begin his career as a PA...John is healing slowly, but surely. He's acting more and more like his upbeat, fun self. He, and our nephews even invented this new game where John comes up with a category (like "The ten scariest animals") and then they have to guess what kind of animals they are. They have so much fun together, laughing and goofing off. It's so good for John, and I love watching them. We love those kids so so much... At John's post-op appointment, the doctor said that he was healing well, and that his stomach had stretched up to 10x its normal size at the hospital, before the surgery! He said that's the biggest he's ever seen... .  3-30-17

Heidi's Surgery-"Hysteroscopy & Laparoscopy"

On March 7th, I had the surgery.  It was outpatient, and he did such a great job and the nurses were so great. I had such a positive experience there at St. Mark's Hospital... I remember when I woke up from the surgery, I thought I was in bed, at home, and the pain I was feeling was from my cycle starting. But no, it was surgery pain. Very intense surgery pain. A lot of the pain was coming from the gas bubbles in my body. They pump you full of air, in order to do this surgery. They stayed with me for weeks!... It took about a week for me to feel like I could go back to work... The findings were in line with what the doctor had initially suspected. The endometriosis was found in many places: a little bit was on my ovary; a lot was in between my uterus and colon; some was on the wall of my abdomen; there was some at the top area in my vagina (TMI, yet?); there was a fibroid tumor on top of my uterus (non-cancerous), which he removed, as well. The inside of my uterus looked great though. 3-30-17

New Job

In the midst of all this craziness, John learned (while he was a patient at Lakeview Hospital) that their Mental Health department was hiring nurses. So, he applied and as luck would have it- he got the job! They offered him a relatively large sign-on bonus as well, since he has such good experience... I'm so proud of him! 3-30-17