Recovering From Surgery Alone

Source: © Photo by Karolina Kaboompics | Pexels

I recently had surgery. In the name of transparency, the kind of surgery I had is called a rectopexy. Read about it at your own risk with the link provided. It was performed through my abdomen, laparoscopically, with the surgeon using a robot. My surgeon said that despite having only four half-inch round incisions on my abdomen, it was major surgery.

What constitutes recovery from surgery? In one study of patients who underwent abdominal surgery, “the meaning of recovery was found to go beyond traditional clinical parameters. The elements of recovery identified [include] returning to habits and routines, resolution of symptoms, overcoming mental strains, regaining independence, and enjoying life.”

One of the unanswered questions is, how long does that recovery take? The easy answer is that everyone’s situation is different as is everyone’s medical condition. One of the harder answers is that the criteria that constitutes recovery is subjective: One person with pain might have difficulty getting off the couch, while another with the same level of pain potentially has no issue with powering through it.

My surgery was on a Thursday, and I was to stay in the hospital for one night, to be discharged on Friday afternoon. The plan was for me to head up to my brother’s home in Connecticut and recuperate there until Sunday afternoon. The surgeon told me I had to work remotely for the first week following the surgery, then I could resume my regular schedule of two days a week in the office.

I had to be at the hospital very early Thursday morning and my brother was going to go to my apartment later Thursday morning and pick up my dog, Shelby, and bring her back to his house.

The day before the surgery, I was able to leave the office early as my last two clients cancelled. Then I received a surprise text from my brother saying he was in the emergency room. It turned out he had appendicitis and would undergo an emergency appendectomy at the same time Thursday morning that I would have my surgery. He also ended up staying overnight as his appendix had ruptured and he needed IV antibiotics. He was discharged Friday morning, and his wife picked him up.

He had arranged for his ex-wife, with whom he remains amicable, to pick up Shelby at my apartment and bring her up to his house. God bless her.

After I was discharged, I drove myself up to his house, where my brother and I recuperated together under the watchful eye of my sister-in-law, who happens to be a physician.

I am extremely grateful for my brother and sister-in-law for still being able to accommodate me and Shelby, following my brother’s emergency surgery. That weekend was only the beginning of both my brother’s and my recovery. We both experienced setbacks after that weekend. My brother got an infection and went back on antibiotics and my pain returned with a vengeance and I ended up back in the emergency room.

I felt some trepidation returning to my apartment alone Sunday evening, especially about needing to walk Shelby. She’s a big strong girl (about 50 pounds) and is reactive to other dogs. Plus, she loves to chase squirrels and rabbits. I was afraid I’d get yanked and tear some stiches inside me. Fortunately, that hasn’t happened.

Although I had stepped down to Tylenol by the time I got home, when the pain returned late Tuesday evening, I went back to the oxycodone the surgeon had sent me home with. I took it as prescribed, but it did make me a little woozy. I was super careful walking around my apartment, taking care to ensure Shelby didn’t get underfoot and cause me to fall. And I couldn’t use it during the day when I was working as I needed to be crystal clear.

Loneliness Essential Reads

Is a Dog or a Cat Better at Relieving Loneliness?

Is It Bad for Kids to Feel Lonely?

I felt isolated that week, especially when, after having spent 10 hours in the emergency room, they couldn’t find a definitive cause for my increased pain. Recovery is tenuous and it’s not just physical; there is an emotional component to it as well. Physically, I needed a lot more sleep, often napping in the middle of the day, even lying down during my lunch hour for a brief power nap. After work, after seeing clients all day, I was emotionally spent and again laid down in the dark—no television, not moving, just trying to recover, until I knew I needed to move to feed and walk Shelby.

It's been well documented that loneliness is an epidemic. “Over four decades of research has produced robust evidence that lacking social connection—and in particular, scoring high on measures of social isolation—is associated with a significantly increased risk for early death from all causes.” (2020 Consensus Study Report, National Academies of Sciences Engineering and Medicine.) Now imagine compounding the feeling of loneliness by adding to it the stress of recovering from a serious surgery alone: dealing with the pain, the loss of independence, the uncertainty, the anxiety, and more. Per the New York Times, “when loneliness goes unchecked, it can be dangerous to our physical and mental health, and has been linked to problems like heart disease, dementia and suicidal ideation.”

One study set out to examine how loneliness affected the outcome of surgery—elective vs. nonelective—in older adults. One of the findings was that “among patients undergoing nonelective surgery, loneliness was associated with higher odds of death at 30 days, meaning the odds of death increased” as the patient’s perception of loneliness also increased.

In researching this post, I found there to be a dearth of studies about recovering alone from surgery. I can’t imagine that this is not a widespread problem, as, according to a study by the Pew Research Center, about 27 percent of American seniors live alone.

I don’t have a solution to the epidemic of loneliness. I do recall the topic even came up in my supervision group at work, when we were discussing cases which involved patients who were senior citizens and how isolated they were—which was contributing to their struggles with their mental health. For right now, all I can do is work with one person at a time.