How long is it going to take my mum to recover from a hysterectomy?

[bran]

I'm a bit worried about my Mum as she is due to go in for a hysterectomy very soon. I'm wondering whether she should be making more arrangements for when she comes out of hospital as she seems to think that it won't be all that bad.

The operation had to be postponed because of my Granny's funeral, but the original plan was for her to have the op on a Monday and come out of hospital on Friday of the same week. So initially she will have plenty of rest.

She has a lot on her plate at home though as my Dad has recently switched to home dialysis which isn't going well at all. It doesn't seem to suit him and he's been tired and run down since it started. Plus the machine alarm goes off a lot during the night and my Dad doesn't sleep well anyway so sometimes turns the light on to read, which all means Mum is hardly getting any sleep. I've suggested that perhaps he could go back to hospital dialysis for a few weeks but she doesn't want to push him to do it if he doesn't want to.

Dad is currently an in-patient as he had to be taken to A+E with difficulty breathing (probably from a change in medication so should be solvable), so she's also very anxious about that which isn't going to help her recovery. He'll probably only be in for a few days and then home, but she'll be worrying about whether he's ok on his own while she's in hospital.

Blimey, that turned into a long post. I didn't realise I was that anxious. I guess I just wish I was living near them and able to keep an eye on them. My DB lives in the same city, but he works very long hours and I doubt he would be able to drop in on them every day to check on them.

Has your mum not had any info from her surgeon as to what she can and can't do?

The general advice seems to be no heavy lifting for at least 6 weeks, no driving for at least 4 weeks and as much rest as possible.

This means putting her feet up as much as she can, not standing cooking for ages, lifting nothing heavier than a samll kettle of water, and not going mad with the hoovering and housework.

are you around to help out?

She's had all the info but she feels it's open to interpretation. For instance, she says that when they say no driving for 4 weeks they mean no long journeys. She plans to get her gardener to bring the boxes of Dad's dialysis fluid in from the garage but she will still be lifting individual bags and connecting them up to the machine.

She only delayed the operation at the family's insistance. She originally thought that she would be fine to have the op last Monday, come out on Friday and have the funeral yesterday.

I'm quite worried that it's a bigger deal than she is telling me it is and she will end up busting her stitches or something. She never lets on when she's not feeling well, she just keeps battling on so I can't rely on her to recognise what's beyond her limits. I might prime my DB to be ready to call an agency for a temporary carer just in case.

She's in Ireland, I live in London. I have a 2 yr old and a 5 yr old who are both loud, and the 5 yr old is particularly demanding and exhusts my Mum and Dad at the best of times, plus workaholic husband who wouldn't be willing to take time off to look after the DC. So I can't see that I would be able to go over to her. Pre-DC I took a week off to stay with her when she had an operation on a detatched retina and it was tough to stop her doing things that required bending over (like emptying the dishwasher).

No driving means no driving- I heard it is because if you do an emergency stop you can do yourself damage. Also, when you reach for the pedals, you do use abdomenal muscles and it "pulls".

She needs to ttake care. She will not appraciate how she will feel tired andhow long it may take toget the anaesthetic out of her system- some people feel depressed or weeepy a few days afterwards.

I had a prolapse repair and the recovery time was the same. I was only 35 but my DH took weeks off work- working from home- and my mum stayed for 2 weeks as Ihad DCs aged 2 &4.

I was fit- but was very tired each day for several weeks.

Your body is repairing itself even though you cannot see it inside!

If she over does it she is in danger of giving herself prolapse as all the tissues need to heal etc.

There is a hysterectomy help forum online- sorry you'll have to ggole- so maybe you and her could look at it?

Thanks PP, after some insistance on my part that she will need complete rest to recover and with my Dad looking as though he will be in hospital for a while still she has decided to postpone the op until after the summer. I think it will be easier all round as I will be living nearby from August onwards so will be able to help her out.

Her insurance will not cover her if she drives while recovering from a hysterectomy. She has to take it very easy, it's a major operation. It took me 7-8 weeks to recover from a proplaspe repair, the Dr said not to lift anything heavier than a paperback book for a few weeks.

That is great bran that you will be living nearby. I winced a bit when I read that she was planning to lift the individual bags of dialysis fluid after her op. My MIL has just had a hysterectomy a month ago and it rather knocked her for six, to be honest. DH walked right past her in the hospital as he didn't recognise her she looked so rough And again, like cocolepew, she was told not to lift anything heavier than a paperback book. She hasn't done much of anything since her op. It will be much better for you all if someone is around to help.... or at least be on hand. It's all the boring stuff like cleaning baths, moving rubbish bags, getting in shopping, picking things up which have fallen on the floor, taking letters to the post etc.

ps. when you mention your DB and DH both being workaholics, it makes me want to start another thread about why it is that care of our aged parents always seems to fall to the women of the family... but anyway, that's another thread.

I would warn her that she won't be insured for driving, bran- would that make her listen? Her whole insurance policy will be invalid for the reasons stated below- emergency stops etc.

Don't you have district nurses who could come and help your dad with his dialysis. I know that when I trained to be a nurse, one of our bit of training was with the nurses on the district. My DN had three people with abdominal dialysis on her books. Those bags are heavy so your dm shouldn't be lifting those.

depends on the individual I was back to normal within a week but I was only 30 wasn't driving but doing most other stuff except lifting.

I'm not sure how the health system works over there kreecher wrt district nurses. There wouldn't be a problem with paying for care though, they could easily afford it. I was more concerned that Mum seemed to think that she wouldn't need any help and then could possibly come unstuck (pun not intended) when she finds that she can't do something that needs to be done and it would be too late to organise help. If I'm living nearby it won't be so bad, if she needs help she can phone me and I can do whatever needs to be done that day and we can contact an agency for help for the following day onwards.

DomesticSlattern, in my DH's family most of the sorting out of MIL's problems falls to his brother as his sister completely useless in a crisis and fairly selfish at other times. So it's not always true that it falls to the women in the family. However I gave up work a couple of years ago so I'm the most available member of the family to help my parents.