My Big Fat Uterus

In late October, I had a hysterectomy, gangnam-style.  No, it was just American style.  My precious baby bag is gone.  My uterus was probably put in a large stainless steel tray to be slowly dissected by a Stanford Medical student and then carelessly thrown out with all the other unwanted organs.  (where do they put those things, ewk)  You see the ol' bag had to go because it was rife with hardened, calcified nodes called uterine fibroids.  The size of my uterus caused my abdomen to look pregnant, four months according to my doctor's measurements.  I knew this anecdotally because my dentist saw me at the gym and asked me if I was preggo. While smiling broadly, she rubbed her belly and then pointed to me,"Do you have good news?"   I said, "No," flatly with an extra heavy sigh.  I wanted to hurt her badly: flick her eyeball or at see her to fall to the ground, incurring a knee scrape, broken nail, busted iphone.  Instead of falling to the floor in a heap as I fantasized, she just let out an indecipherable sound like"meep" and then slunk away.  

I lived life with my 'stone baby' uterus for 3 years.  I was scared to do anything about it.  I knew that a hysterectomy was the recommendation by not 1 but 5 doctors but it seemed barbaric:  chopping out a vital organ through a large incision.  I have had 2 c-sections so they would use the same scar.  It seemed like something that 60 year old women did or at least women who wear elastic pants or SAS shoes (google it).    To avoid unnecessary butchery, I researched all the new medical procedures to deal with the problem.  It was eye opening.  Procedures included using sound waves to disintegrate the fibroids, robotic surgery to cut out the fibroids, to literally starving the uterus' blood supply by inserting tiny beads into arteries in your thighs.  My head was dizzy so I caved into my ruminating tendencies with the force of the great Niagara.  I watched Youtube videos of bloody operations and read HysterSysters - an online group dedicated to women who were thinking about or going to have hysterectomies.  My husband worried as he saw me but said nothing.  He knew that this was just the beginning.  

After 2 more years of delaying this process and buying baby-doll shirts, leggings with wide elastic bands to hide my problem areas - I decided that I was spinning.  I had booked the surgery 2 times and then cancelled it.  As my final stand, I called up my OB/GYN who delivered my kids.  This was the second time I had met with him to discuss the procedure (9 months earlier).  He wanted to do the abdominal method - traditional clip, snip and zip.  I booked the procedure for the following week.  I was very scared but felt like this would be a positive step in my life.  I was tired of feeling pregnant, of having a giant belly, of having to pee all the time, of not being able to lie on my stomach.  It was gross. I tried to "love" my body the way it was but I was starting to despise my not pretty rock hard but not in a nice way abs. 

I went ahead with the surgery.  It was uncomfortable but not painful.  I felt exhausted.  It was hard to walk for first couple of days.  I couldn't even walk very fast.  It was different from c-sections where you have a screaming baby to care for or I mean, the wonder of new life.  This time my hospital room was silent and I could just lie around and watch the weird hospital TV while trying to fart so they would give me solid food.  This time I had two bigger kids who asked me when I was going to come home and who looked really freaked out when they visited me in the hospital.  I knew I had to get better fast so things could go back to normal and I could be a strong Mom again.  

The road to recovery has been slow.  I'm 6 weeks out and I still feel breathless when going on a very easy walk down the block.  I feel like I never have exercised before.  I used to do 10ks and run about 3 miles with no problem.  Now I feel very weird - lack of endorphins is kinda making me sad.  So I'm going to keep walking, build up my strength and eventually get back to running again with my running posse.  Hopefully I won't see the inside of Stanford Hospital for a while.