Since I haven’t been feeling well lately, my family doctor suggested I see a gastroenterologist. I saw him on Tuesday, and he suggested I have a endoscopy to see if there was anything unusual in my stomach. So we scheduled it for Friday and I wasn’t too worried about it.
This morning I went in with my mom and my gastroenterologist performed an endoscopy on me. I guess I should have asked more questions beforehand because I didn’t really know what the procedure entailed. I knew they were going to sedate me and shove a tube down my throat and look at my stomach, but I guess I wasn’t really aware how potentially serious the procedure is. They kept me on a heart monitor and took my blood pressure every five minutes (ouch haha) and put those oxygen tubes in my nose (uncomfortable) and I had an IV. They put me in the procedure room and after about 10 minutes I was getting antsy to start this thing, I was pretty cold. Also I was getting kind of scared because the only kind of surgery I’ve ever had is getting my wisdom teeth out. Even though I knew it wasn’t really surgery, I was afraid they would find something terrible. Finally the nurse and doctor came in and she started up my IV with the sedatives in it. The nurse asked me to lay on my side and then she started talking to me about the bite bit, after that it’s all blank.
I woke up in the receiving area about 20 minutes later I guess but I don’t think I was really ready to get up yet. I was very confused, so I was looking around trying to figure out where I was, what time it was, etc, when a nurse saw me and was surprised to see me awake. They expected me to sleep for another 15 minutes. They helped me put my sweatshirt on and get into a wheelchair, and then asked me to say something so they could make sure my vocal chords weren’t damaged or anything. Although I didn’t feel much pain in my throat (I still don’t — it’s sore, but not unbearable) I couldn’t really remember how to operate my vocal chords is the best way of describing it, lol. I was still pretty drugged up at this time. I tried to make the air go through my throat but no sound came out when I did. The nurse gently encouraged me, but I got frustrated and started crying. (I HATE it when I do that… it’s so frustrating! And then I get even more frustrated with myself for crying and being weak, which makes me cry.) She went and got my mom and decided to go get the doctor. My mom sat with me and calmed me down, and I tried for a few more minutes to talk. By the time the doctor came I was able to talk perfectly well, so a nurse wheeled me down to the car and we went home.
For some reason I got kind of carsick on the way home (I NEVER get carsick) . When I got home I parked myself on the easy chair, turned on the TV and fell asleep for a couple hours. When I woke up around 12:30 I was STARVING (I hadn’t had anything to eat or drink since dinner the night before) so I whipped up some hot tea, a can of soup and ate the entire thing, haha. I think I must have eaten it too fast because for the next couple of hours I felt nauseous.
Anyway, the doctor said there were some red areas in my stomach that they took biopsies of, but other than that everything looked good. We’ll get the results for that on Monday. Next week I need to go to the lab and get a blood test, they will test me for Celiac Disease and IBD.
I need to finish up my taxes today, too. Such a bad girl… :angel:
Hi,
I was doing some online research on the Endoscopy procedure and came across your page. I’ll be going through this next week Thursday & just made my appointment today. I think I am freaking out….very unlike me. I’ve never really had anything this big done to me – that’s probably why.
Anyways, I found your story/description helpful. Thanks!
Cool it turned out okay.
D
glad it helped. Turns out the biopsies didn’t find anything, which is good and bad I guess. You have nothing to freak out about, it was almost completely painless (uncomfortable sore throat for a couple days) but that’s it. Hope it turns out okay for you!!