Somehow the picture describes how I feel right now about surgery. I’m nervous but hopeful. I’ve said that with each update but it’s more true now than ever.

Like the hallway, it’s been a long road to get here and once I reach the end it’s not really the end. I’m told my recovery will be short but painful. It’s not guaranteed to fix everything but any small amount of my regular pain going away is welcome.

I’m supposed to be at the hospital at 7:30 am but I’m one of those people that would rather be thirty minutes early than thirty seconds late so we’ll probably get there closer to 7:00. I should make myself wait until that time to leave the house since it’s only a 10-15 minute drive though.

There is a potential problem that has me very concerned. On Friday around 4:00 pm, a woman from the hospital called me and told me my insurance hadn’t given an approval yet. She said if the approval didn’t come through by the end of the day there could be a delay on Monday morning and she just wanted to give me a heads up. My heart dropped. My insurance has had almost two weeks to get their job done. My imagination went crazy. Would they not approve the surgery? If they did, would it be in time? What the hell was their problem?

So I did what any smart person would do and I called my mom. She worked in Human Resources for years and years so I knew she could tell me what to do. She told me to call the insurance and be really nice and ask them to speed up. Those were not her exact words of course. I hung up with her and called. I reached a really nice lady from the east coast who I attempted to use my southern charm on to get her to help me. It worked, at least as much as it could. She changed the priority on my paperwork to ‘high’ and put a note on the account saying the doctor might cancel my surgery if I didn’t get a determination that day.

I won’t know until I get to admitting if it went through but I feel like I did everything I possibly could to make it happen (thanks mom).

My doctor said I should be in the hospital for two nights. I’m not taking my laptop so I probably won’t be posting an update until I get home. Well, I will have my phone so who knows, I’ve written posts from the hospital before. You might hear from me sooner than I think. Even if you don’t hear from me for a week or so, I’ll be lurking around reading everyone else’s blog.

Wish me luck! I’ll be back as soon as I can.