I got through the next two weeks in a lot of pain, but by God's amazing grace. Each day in my devotions I found something more awesome about my God, and something sweeter about His presence. The phrase "God is all I need" became very real to me, but I found myself changing it to, "God is not only all I need, He is all I want!" My mom came up on the 15th (Wednesday) and spent the day with me, and on Thursday, my mom attended chapel with me. After classes on Thursday my mom and I took off for home to have my gall bladder removed. We got home about 1:45 in the morning, and went straight to bed. The next morning I had to be at the hospital at 10:00 for preparation for the surgery. I had IV's hooked up to me, and fluids of some sort started, and they took some more tests (urine, and blood) and then just let me rest for a while. Finally coming into the room, the surgeon came in and asked me if I was going to be all right, or if I wanted something to make me relax when I'm in the surgical room. I thought about it, and chose to have the "relaxer" medicine. The inserted something into the IV in my hand and I immediately felt something akin to the morphine. I asked what it was, and the nurse described it as, "Sort of like a cocktail except it works immediately.". I tried to nod through the dizziness that I was experiencing, and shut my eyes.
I don't remember much after that except for "waking up" in a white room with three big round bowl shaped things with about 10 light bulbs in each of them, and having about four people with masks on around me. I don't remember . . . I remember hearing them saying something about that they were going to take my gall bladder out, or, something like that, and honestly, I was too drugged to care. They put this mask over my face, and they told me to breathe in a few big breaths. I remember seeing the mask come down over my mouth and nose, and trying to take a deep breath in. I remember . . . the smell of it . . . it was almost sweet . . . I think I took about 4-5 breaths in, and shut my eyes to blink or something, or maybe I did it just to rest my eyes, and next thing I know I'm waking up in this long corridor with a couple nurses on my left side checking vitals and stuff. I opened my eyes, looked around, and promptly fell back to sleep. I did this about two other times as well, and after finally being strong enough/awake enough to tell the nurses that I was cold, they gave me another blanket, and I, once again, fell into a deep sleep. I don't know what time it was, or how long I had been sleeping, but I finally woke up, and was able to stay awake enough to hear the nurse say, "Do you feel strong enough to go to a recovery room?" I nodded, and don't remember any of the trip back to a recovery room. I just know that it seemed to take forever for my mom and Mrs. Rios to get there. "Mom . . ." I managed to say weakly. She smiled at me, and took my hand gently. I fell back to sleep, and next thing I heard was my dad's voice in the room saying, "How long has she been asleep?" my eyes flew open and managed to focus on him. I held out my hand to him, and he took it, and squeezed it gently. I sighed heavily and pushed the button on my bed control that made me sit up. The nurse came in a while later and asked me if I wanted anything to drink and eat. I nodded because I was extremely thirsty, and so I got some Sierra Mist and Apple sauce and was able to eat a little of the apple sauce and drink the Sierra Mist.
After signing the release forms (after the drugs had worn off) I was finally allowed to leave. I was so hungry though. I requested to go to Olive Garden for dinner that night since they had their "Never Ending Pasta Bowls" for a time. We got there, and I was barely able to stay awake.
The next day, Saturday, I pretty much just rested, but we had a friend over to look at my computer. Sunday we packed up the car and headed back up to Northland. However, this isn't the end, oh no, far from it. No, this is just the beginning . . .
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