The burdens of surgery to everyone else.

Feb 24

Feb 24 The burdens of surgery to everyone else.

Since I started on this journey a lot of people have talked about how great this will be for me. What a change it will be to my life, how tough the early stages will be like when I was in pre surgery prep, or where I am now in the early stages after surgery. They tell me about how I soon won’t recognise myself, how my routine will change and it will be totally worth it.

It’s all been super positive, and it’s all been about me but no one really has thought much about how much this changes other people’s lives.

Top of the list being my amazing husband Rob.

Going through all of the pre surgery prep, and then changing my lifestyle completely after surgery has just as much of an impact of Rob’s life as it has on mine.

When I started on Optifast Rob was very generous and opted not to eat dinner at home for the first few nights so I could ease into the change. It would be a lot easier to get into a routine if I wasn’t watching every mouthful of food he took with sad, desperate puppy dog eyes.

By day three I was good to go, so even though he planned to eat out, a super late meeting with one of his stores meant it was just easier to bring food home. I had to laugh when I saw him standing outside the front door for a few minutes, food in hand and sadly mouthing “I’m Sorry” before coming inside.

Honestly though, I was fine.

What I think a lot of people forget is that it is just the two of us (and our adorable dog Gizmo) living here so typically we would cook for two people with maybe some left over bits for me to use for lunch for the next day. Cooking for two people is pretty easy, managing wastage becomes a lot easier, and it makes planning meals a lot more structured. The first few days we had planned that Rob would just have his dinners out so we wouldn’t have to think about making separate meals, or trying to work in my tiny cups of vegetables with food that works for him too.

Rob is one of those people that often forgets to eat. He never puts on weight, can have whatever he wants, but has never been one to eat breakfast (unless we are talking a big, full cooked English breakfast) and pretty much lives on coffee. If we don’t actively make sure to plan out meals he’s very prone to either not eat because he forgets, goes ‘whatever,’ and grab some takeaways (seriously..the guy never puts on weight, is crazy fit, and at one point had the same body fat percentage as Usain Bolt. If I didn’t love him I would actually hate him) or he would just eat randomly accessible food at home.

This is why I’m usually pretty organised in planning out what our week will look like, what meals I’d cook so I would know we’d both eaten. While neither of us would say no to a cheeky little trip to our favourite Malaysian restaurant, or a dirty little venture to the Golden Arches, when given the choice of take away or a healthy home cooked meal we usually would take the later. My Food Bag made things easy on weeks when we knew it was going to be manic for both of us at work.

We had a routine and it worked. Now here I come with this big change that has completely messed up what worked.

Following surgery it meant even more sacrifices on his part.

The cost of going private for surgery aside, it meant not only me having time off work to recover, but Rob needed time off work as well to be there to help me in my recovery. He even gave up a work trip to Australia because I still was far from being in a spot where I could be on my own.

Rob gave up sleeping in our bed for the first week and a half because of where all my post surgery wounds were and the risk of him accidentally catching them while I slept. He had to help me in and out of bed, heat up my pureed food for me and even help me shower for the first week. It’s a lot to do and it’s a lot I don’t think people consider when they hear someone is having surgery.

Since Rob was forced onto the couch while I was in the early stages of recovery Gizmo would always make sure to come out in the morning and nap with Rob to keep him company.

It wasn’t just Rob that ended up bearing the burdens of my choice to have surgery.

There was my amazing mum who dropped everything, took time off and flew up to be here when I went in to surgery, was there everyday for me in hospital and then spent over a week staying with us to help Rob with looking after me.

She made sure Gizmo had a long walk every morning, helped get me out of bed, managed all my pain medication for me, helped me walk everyday so I wouldn’t run the risk of blood clots and just like Rob had to help me shower in the early days.

Remember last time when I said you lose a lot of dignity in hospital? Same thing happens at home after a surgery as well. When you reach 38 years old you really don’t think you’ll be needing to ask for mummy’s help in showering.

As amazing as it was having mum come up here, it then also added to the extra work Rob had to do to ensure they were both still getting fed. See he’s fine with forgetting about eating and then remembering about 8:30 that “oh yeah, I should probably eat something”. My mum not so much, so the pressures of replanning meals landed back on Rob to do since it was usually my main thing.

Even outside of my family my decision to have surgery was a burden to other people.

At work my team had to pick up the slack while I was away. People had to cover for me on big time critical projects and learn pretty quickly how tough it can be to be me at work sometimes. Resources were stretched because we were running one down at a very very important time.

Heck, even the dog is burdened with my choice. He didn’t go to doggy daycare for three weeks, even now still can’t sit on my lap, and since I’m not allowed to lift anything heavier than 3kgs he needs to wait until there are other people free to help me get him out of the car if we go somewhere. He can jump in, can’t jump out on his own. While I was in hospital he noticed I wasn’t at home which made him worry so he prowled around the house searching for me.

My decision to have surgery made my dog worry. There is no amount of sad, crying emoji’s that can adequately sum up how that makes me feel.

My in-laws felt the effort when we would go over for lunch. It’s that need to remember not to over cater because at the time I was just on shakes. There is also that certain feeling of guilt that those caring family members and friends may suffer because they know they are eating something you wish you could. They may seem like silly little things, but it can all add up.

So…here’s what I will say to people considering surgery. Look at all aspects of your life first. Don’t just think about what it means for you to make this change, look at the others members of your family you might live with, or your friends. I don’t mean make your decision based solely on if it’s an inconvenience to them, I just mean think about that fact that it will impact their lives too and remember that they may need support or time to adjust as well.

It takes a village people, and my god, I’m so damn glad for my village. I wouldn’t be half as far along if it wasn’t for them.