September 11, 2014 - Surgery Day

On the morning of September 11, 2014, a nurse came in to shave all of my hair off. I was still okay with it. There really wasn't anything I could do about it anyways. I had always wanted to know what it was like to have short hair and now I was going to be able to find out. He started shaving it off. It was kind of rough on my head, but it didn't hurt. I was afraid that he was going to cut my head. Once all of my hair was off, he put some styrofoam stickers on my head that looked like the letter "0". My sister said, "That's where my fruit loops went!"

I only remember one thing that happened next. I remember being wheeled out of my ICU room in my bed to the surgery room. That is it.

They brought in a neurological mapping team for my surgery. They woke me up during my surgery and showed me flash cards. They said that I had another seizure during my surgery, but I had no idea. They had to cut open my head and cut my skull to get rid of the AVM. They removed the AVM and cauterized what they cut so it wouldn't bleed. The put metal plates in my head to replace my skull and sewed up my head. I have a cool scar now. :)

My surgery lasted 6 hours. They wrapped gauze all around my head so that it formed like a permanent hat on my head. I slept until the next day. When I woke up.....I couldn't talk.

It scared my family. I would just stare at people. I was told that I had this blank stare and would look at people, but it was like I was looking through people. I knew what people were saying to me, but I couldn't make myself say anything. When I finally did speak, I could only say about 1 new word per hour. Someone would ask me my mine and I would say that it was "Miranda" and then they would ask me how I was doing and I would say "Miranda". If I said one thing, I couldn't say anything different for a while.

A lot of people visited me in the hospital. Family members, friends, people from my home ward and people from my student ward. Friends were putting my name on the temple prayer list and people were praying for me. It was so nice how many people cared for me.

I was EXTREMELY restless in the hospital. I moved all the time. I even might have shown off my butt to a few people including Tyler haha. My mom was rubbing my legs during the night to get me to calm down. There was one night where I remember just staring at the clock thinking that time was going by SOO slowly. I was in pain and they couldn't give me anymore medicine. I had to wait. That night felt like it was going to last for forever.

I was getting so sick of the wrap on my head, so one night, I took it off. It wasn't something that could easily come off. I would move it a little bit several times and the nurses would tell me to stop touching it. I didn't listen to them. I finally was able to remove it one night and it felt so nice. BUT.....then the nurse came in, saw that I had taken it off and hurried and put it back on. I was so annoyed. Why couldn't they just let me have it off?? (Obviously, they knew better than I did in that situation)

They got me up daily to walk around the floor. I got really tired after walking around the floor once. I think the most I walked around the floor was 3 maybe 4 times. The nurses and my mom had to help me with everything in the ICU. I was moved to another floor after several days when I was improving. My physical therapist was a family friend, Amanda Longhurst, so it was nice seeing someone I knew.

I loved having the hospital bring me food haha. A lot of people don't like hospital food, and it wasn't the best food I've ever had, but I was always excited to get food. (Probably because I was always hungry)

For insurance purposes, they had to move me to the University of Utah hospital. I rode in a van in a wheelchair from Provo to Salt Lake City. They gave me one of those blue blags to throw up in and I didn't think I would need it, but I did. When we arrived and the car stopped, I threw up. The driver was so chill about it haha. I think he said he has seen many people throw up and I bet he has. I threw up a lot while I was in the hospital.

At the University of Utah hospital, I had Speech Therapy, Occupational Therapy and Physical Therapy. I was always happy when all of my therapies were done. I just wanted to go sleep, watch tv or eat haha. We rented a couple of movies at the University of Utah hospital. I remember watching Heaven is for Real and The Fault in our Stars. In Occupational Therapy, I got to make my famous chocolate chip cookies (Balls of Heaven). While I was making them, I stuck my hand in the bowl while it was mixing to grab something or fix something and the lady watching me asked me if that was a good thing to do. No it wasn't, but at the time, I didn't care one bit.

In Speech Therapy, I did some memorizing, in Occupation Therapy, we did some puzzles, games, baking and shopping (not actually buying stuff) and in Physical Therapy, we walked around the hospital, did some exercises and played guitar hero.

I was in the hospital for a total of 16 days. (UVRMC and U of U) I had always wanted to go to the hospital for something (I know I'm weird), but only stay for one day, NOT 16! I was SO ready to leave when I did.

I had fluid leaking from my scar the night before I was supposed to go home, so the next day my doctor wanted to check with Dr. Gardner, my neurosurgeon, that everything was good. I was supposed to leave in the morning, but I didn't leave until the afternoon. I almost didn't leave that day. I WAS NOT going to stay in the hospital for another day though. I was READY to leave. I was so impatient. He said he was going to check with Dr. Gardner and Dr. Gardner happened to be in a surgery at that time. The doctor said that I might have to stay another day and my mood just dropped. About 20 minutes later, he came back in and said that Dr. Gardner told him everything was all good. I immediately got up and started packing everything up. My mom said, "We still have to wait for the nurse to check us out". Ugh! Another thing to wait for. The nurse finally came and gave us some papers and checked us out. THEN, we had to wait for the wheelchair to come up and take me out. I played the piano to pass the time. The wheelchair finally came and I was out!!! I had all of the gifts I had received in my lap while they were wheeling me out.

It was a strange feeling as we were driving away from the hospital and driving home. I hadn't been outside in 16 days and it felt like it wasn't real!

My family had set up signs around our neighborhood to welcome me home. My mom started filming me as we entered the neighborhood to get my reaction. (When my family found out that I might not come home that day, they were not happy. They set up everything and they wanted me home that day) My house had balloons and a big sign on our garage door welcoming me home. It was so nice!

As a celebration, we went to the Spaghetti Factory! In the hospital, I called it "Super Sonic Spaghetti Burger" instead of the Spaghetti Factory. I said so many weird things.

I was so happy to be out of the hospital. It was a long recovery (I am still recovering). It is weird to think that I actually had Brain Surgery.