Ahhhhh... Comfortable Sleep, Finally!

Sleeping has been a problem since I had my surgery last 17 October. It's not that I haven't slept for the past month, but it's just that I haven't slept well enough to call it a good night's sleep.

The first six nights after surgery, I was still in hospital and the bed in my room was a pain in the ass - literally! It was meant to be a therapeutic bed which inflates/deflates in different areas on its own, thereby helping blood circulation and prevent bed sores. But for someone with a tube stuck in my behind and eating nothing but liquids (ie, constant diarrhea), that motion also makes you want to poop all the time - even when you're sleeping.

Getting home from hospital, I was excited to be sleeping on a normal bed again and away from the air mattress from hell. But I ended up enduring a long weekend of extreme pain because my wound got infected. We didn't know then until the 27th of October, when the doctor removed my staples and found the wound dehisced (reopened). I had to sleep that night knowing I had a 6cm long, 3cm hole in my tummy with just a couple of surgical tapes holding them together. I was worried sick that it will continue to open up and my insides will spill out.

The following day, I was at the hospital again for wound treatment. They opened it up a little more so that they can clean up the pus, blood and what not. They then dressed it by pushing a long white saline-drenched gauze into my already sore insides. That was really painful. That went on everyday for a week with a community nurse popping by the house daily to do it. I didn't really sleep much that week. Every time I moved, I felt the gauze scraping the inner walls of my tummy. It also didn't help that my bowel was not completely normal so I had to wake up and visit the toilet at least 4 times during sleeping hours.

This is how I like to sleep.
Without the milk bottle, of course.

On the 3rd of November the hospital put an Acti-VAC system on me which helped a great deal. It's a vaccuum system with tubes attached to a sponge that's inserted in the wound. It helped the wound dry up and heal faster. It was great but was terribly uncomfortable when sleeping. First, there's that sucking sensation you feel on your sore wound 24 hours a day. Second, there's a transparent dressing taped to my lower abdomen which embarrassingly was painfully pulling on the hair down there. Third, the tube connecting the wound to the VAC was all over the place. I couldn't sleep worrying that a small wrong move will violently tear the tube and all its attachments out of my gaping hole. That would really hurt, wouldn't it? Fourth, I had to be connected to a charger all night. Well not me, the VAC device. I had to struggle with this for 2 weeks, although I must admit that it went better as the day progressed.

And today, exactly one month after my surgery, I finally had a really good sleep. The VAC was removed yesterday and replaced with simple Aquacel dressing. It felt so free that I woke up this morning lying on my stomach - my preferred sleeping position - something that I had wanted to do in what seemed like 10,000 years!