A – Anaesthetic

In my 27 years I’ve had 6 operations all under general anaesthetic.

The first one I had when I was 2 and it was to get a nerve removed from my ankle so they could do some tests on it to try to find out what was wrong with me. Being 2 years old, I don’t remember so we’ll swiftly move on.

Surgery number 2 (don’t worry im not going to talk about them all haha) was my first back operation where i had my spine straightened and a rod fitted from the 3rd vertebrae at the top down to the 4th bottom vertebrae of my spine.

I was 13 when I had this surgery so following my nil by mouth, in the morning I was given a pre-med which made me very sleepy before heading down to the theatre so for both this and my third op i don’t really remember going under, pre surgery.

My back surgery – I’m just referring to my first one here, I might touch on why i had it twice another day but for now I’m just referring to numero uno. This surgery took 8 hours total. When i was taken up to intensive care (ICU) I VIVIDLY remember after having my whole spine realigned and the anaesthetic began to wear off, I was supposed to be on 1mg of morphine but instead i was on 0.01mg and I don’t think I’ll ever forget the pain. On top of me being on the wrong dose of pain relief – the morphine had to be self administered from a cylinder shape device that had an inverted button on one end WHICH MY LIL SPAGHETTI FINGERS COULDN’T PRESS 😦 In the end I was able to get a different button and get on track with pushing that wee guy like maddddddd. 

In all this craziness and between projectile vomiting over everyone, as my anaesthetic started to wear off I was in wonderland. In my mind my surgeon was Shrek and my nurse was Alice from Alice in Wonderland and i could not have been more certain this was reality. I also became a spewing fountain of secrets and did not leave a corner of my life uncovered to those nurses and my Mum. The worst one I remember is disclosing my childhood crush – Hannah if you read this, you know who I mean! Traumatic hahahah.

I’ve also had an operation on each ankle at separate times and being a little older I didn’t have a pre-med. I was wheeled down to theatre on my hospital bed and even though I had had surgery before, I had always been knocked out by this point, so it was very daunting being conscious. 

I was scared and did get upset, then when they put the mask on me i did panic a bit. It doesn’t take long to ‘go under’ but the sensation is very unique. I felt like I was losing all control of my body but my mind was slightly behind, I was worried I wouldn’t be able to tell them that I wasn’t asleep! Especially after reading 100 conspiracy theories about anaesthetic.

It’s not an experience I would describe as enjoyable but i got a lot of reassurance from the amazing nurses and team with me after my Mum could stay with me. I know 6 surgeries is more than average but it’s definitely not as many as some.

If you ever have surgery coming up, ask questions, the more the nurses explained to me the calmer I was. Also try to have things to do to distract you beforehand to keep your mind busy. Know that it’s ok to find it daunting and scary and cry if you need to. Trust that things will be ok but do not trust yourself to keep your secrets to yourself.