June 14, 2008 6:09 PM BST
Hi!
A few moons ago I spoke to someone who was up for SRS who asked me for some tips and information and I figured I'd post some of my tips here in case anyone is interested.
These are just some practical tips, I leave the medical stuff to the people who know about them =)
You will be spending a lot of time lying on your back, probably almost an entire week at the hospital and even more when getting back home so the tip is learn to sleep on your back. I am/was used to sleeping on my side and pulling my knees up a bit and spending so much time lying flat on my back gave me serious back pain. In fact, the pain in my back was far worse than anything that had to do with the surgery.
Build up some muscles, especially legs and abs.
When you are able to move around a bit after surgery you will need to use these muscles more than you are used to and they will be seriously weekend from spending so much time in a hospital bed . I know most TS don't like to build up any muscles but if there is a time to get some, it's before surgery.
Also, get in shape. You will be weak after suregery and even a few weeks after coming home, you will still get tired really quickly from doing everyday things like shop for groceries and go for walks.
Buy lubricant as you will be doing a lot of dilating.
First, go and put lots of it in your shopping bag. Then go back to the shelf and get twice as much as you first planned for. No matter how much you buy, you will eventually use it up. I like the silicon based ones as they aren't as messy as the water based but to each their own.
Buy sanitation pads.
You will need them, you will need lots of them and you will need them for a long time.
Buy comfy cotton underwear.
You will be sore, swollen and possibly in and out of pain. Comfort comes before looks now.
Take care of that ass.
Sitting down will not be something you will do a lot of for the first week(s) after suregery. Get one of those rubber rings pregnant women sometimes uses to sit on. Believe me, it will come in really handy.
Rethink your morning ritual ahead of time.
You will need a lot of more time to get ready for your everyday life and if you can start working 50% and then move up in time, this will help in finding your morning ritual and get back to an everyday life.
Different surgeons have different dilation schedules but you will probably be put on 30-45 minutes in the mornings to start with. 30 minutes means even more time in practice since you need preparation time and clean up time too. The problem is that you don't just ”do it”, there is a lot more to it than just waking up, placing the dilator where it belongs and wait for 30 minutes. Plan for at least an hour of extra time added to your morning routines for this. There is no room for cheating here, sorry. In fact, for a while after surgery you will feel that dilation is your entire life.
Also, I found a rather nice page on the internet that might get you some ideas about what to expect and perhaps ask you surgeon about.
http://www.intelleng.com/zen.html . A little warning, it's not entirely safe to read at work for instance.
Hope this was interesting to someone.... =)