I have just over a week to go and I am totally freaking out. Too nauseated to eat much, too jittery to sleep. I don't know how I'm going to put up with another week of this. I don't know what my problem is--I don't even have a strict pre-op diet to follow. The surgeon's office told me to just stick to clear liquids for 24 hours before surgery. Other than that, I can still eat what I want. Well, okay, I could eat what I wanted if I weren't sick from nerves.

I'm an avowed coward, and I keep worrying that I'm going to be in terrible pain. For complicated reasons, I can't take Tylenol, and NSAIDs will be off-limits post-surgery. My hepatologist's office seems to think I'm just going to "tough it out." AHAHAHAHAHAHAHA ::deep, rattling wheeeeze:: . . . ha. I get my whole mouth numbed up just to have my teeth cleaned. If they're going to kick me out of the hospital without pain meds, I'll just insist on staying in the hospital an extra day or two, nursing my drip. From what I hear, I should be okay after the first few days. I just don't want to be lying there feeling like someone stuck a knife into my belly 5 times. (They will actually have stuck a knife in my belly 5 times--I just don't want to feel like it.)

I also have a collection of rampant What-Ifs running around my brain. What if I feel so sick afterward that I can't eat or drink? What if I make a wrong move and pop my stitches? What if I have a leak? What if my currently-supportive family gets annoyed with taking care of me before I'm able to do things on my own? After all, I'm not supposed to lift more than 5 pounds for 6 weeks. That's a lot of fetching and schlepping to delegate to the relatives. What if I have disastrous complications and just keel over and die?

I know that some of these things are not terribly likely, and that in my case the risks of the surgery are less than the risks of doing nothing. But damn, I am a nervous, twitching wreck.