Preparing for Surgery

Before surgery there a lot of things you have to do. I had to take a shower for the 2 days prior with Hibiclens.

The instructions are on the bottle they give you, and you cannot get it into your eyes, mouth or anywhere in your private areas.

It is a little bit drying, and your skin feels weird afterward. But it leaves something on your skin that protects it from infection.

I had to stop taking some medication a week before the surgery and some two days before, some the day before. I made a chart for the week leading up to surgery with everything I had to do every day to make sure I did it right.

Some things I wish I had done before surgery that you may want to think about:

Get a shower chair.  I did not get one, but it might be helpful. I would have used one if I had one for those first couple of days.  A plastic folding chair in the shower could also work - like the ones you can get at Costco. It was hard to stand there for the whole shower with my back to the shower, not able to lift my arms over my head and my husband having to shampoo my hair and wash my back. A chair would have helped.

Get a toilet riser or booster. This was a big issue for me the first couple of days. We have very low toilets in our upstairs bedrooms. They are whatever the standard toilet is they put in houses. I also had a little knee issue and related strength issues in that leg, but you can't push off the countertop with your arms to stand up. They want you to stand upright without using your arms.  This is much harder to do when the toilet is lower and you are weaker.  Not using your arms is going to be the big thing to remember for the first month or so.

This is the one we ended up ordering and my husband said it was easy to install. 

When we didn't need it anymore it was also easy to remove.

The higher nature of the seat helped me the most. I tried not to use the arms to help myself stand more than I had to. 

Get a shower head wand. We ordered one once I got home, but by the time it arrived from Amazon, I was doing better in the shower and we didn't need it.  You cannot let the shower spray hit your incision, so a shower wand will help you rinse off better. 

Get a handy carrying bag. I kept my spirometer, my chapstick, medicines, cell phone charger and other assorted things in my bag and brought it with me from room to room while I was recovering so I always had it with me. Once I came downstairs for the day, I wanted to make sure I had everything I needed. I also carried my hugging bear with me always!