Preparing

So for the next couple weeks I was just trying to prepare for when I would be gone.... I had to make sure someone would take care of my dogs, Harley gets so sad when I leave him I don't think Spice really cares but... I still wanted to make sure that someone would be able to give them lots of attention while I was away so they wouldn't be sad. I also had to make sure that someone was watching my horses and making sure that they were getting all their feed, cleaning stalls, cleaning pens etc. As if it isn't hard enough to find someone to watch just my animals but because my mom was coming with me we had to find someone to watch all her animals too.... so that's a total of 5 dogs, and 5 horses...... luckily for us my mom has some great friends that agreed to care for the horses and my sisters were going to take turns with the dogs.
The next thing that I had to do was make sure that someone could cover me at work. We have a part time lady that we asked to cover my position while I was gone. So I had to go through everything that I do on a daily basis and write it out for her. This actually took a while because I had to write EVERYTHING out.... even things that I thought were easy. I had to remember that poor Wilema had never done my job and she wouldn't have a clue of what to do. It took me about a week to go through everything, even when I thought I had everything wrote out something would come up that I forgot. I finally thought I had what I like to call "Stacy's Bible" completed. Wilema came in and I showed her the "Bible". I had forgot what it was like for me when I first started (I had been doing this for 2 years and it came really easy for me now). So for the next couple weeks she came in a couple times a week to learn my job. She did really well but I was wishing that I had more time to train her. Plus about 4 days before I left for my surgery one of the programs that I use was updated and totally different than what I had been teaching her.... so now I had to learn it and teach Wilema how to do it..... I was a little stressed out! Scott (one of the guys that I work for) said for me not to worry about it, they will figure it out, and if not then it would be there for me when I returned!
I found out that my surgery was going to be on May 7th (which happens to be my Dad Jack's birthday). I was going to have to be admitted to the hospital on May 6th for pre-surgery admission. This meant that my mom and I would have to leave on the 5th. Time flew by because I was busy trying to get everything ready for when I was gone. I didn't know EXACTLY how long I was going to be off work (Dr McMullen said about a month but Doctor Chik said at least 2 months) so I wanted to make sure that Wilema could do my month end stuff and everything that needed to get done for at least a month. Mom and I hauled hay for the horses, I made sure that my dogs had their little treats, and I spent as much time as I could doing the things that I like doing.... riding my horse, playing with my dogs and spending as much time as I could with my family (especially Logan).
The weekend before my surgery my sister Jaimie organized a "Pre-surgery Party" for me and invited all my closest friends and family. She had it at a local pub and had it decorated and bought a teddy bear that I could take with me to my surgery. She bought him a little t-shirt and got everyone to sign it for me. Jasta (a close friend) got everyone to stand up and introduce themselves and say how they knew me or something nice about me.... I was doing okay until Kaelyn stood up to talk. Kaelyn and I have known each other since grade 11 and I absolutely love her.... she is one of my closest friends. Her and I have been through a lot together and she came and seen me in the hospital when I had my first surgery.... she has seen me at my absolute worst and she still loves me! Anyways I was bawling and it just got worse as more people stood up to talk.... it really made me realize that I have the most WONDERFUL friends and family... and I know that they all really care about me (I am not going to name everyone but you know who you are... and I just want to say that I love everyone of you and I have so much fun when I am with you guys!). We stayed at the pub for a while and played some fun drinking games (which even my mom and Dad participated in... although I think they were both drinking Coke not booze!) and we all had a blast! After that we went to the bar and I must say that the rest of the night is kind of a blur..... but I am sure it was a good time! :)
So I worked that Monday and half of Tuesday and then my mom and I headed for Sherry's house. Sherry is a family friend and she lives near Edmonton. She has always offered for me to stay with her and I have a couple times when I go to Edmonton. Great lady. Anyways mom and I arrived at Sherry's around 9 pm and we had supper and just sort of relaxed. I had to call the hospital the next morning to find out what time I was supposed to be at the hospital. I didn't get a lot of sleep that night.... my head was spinning.... I almost couldn't believe that I was going to have ANOTHER surgery. I had it in my head that my body would have straightened out before we got to this point and I wouldn't have to do this again... I wouldn't have to stay in the hospital, I wouldn't have to have IV's all over and I wouldn't have to go through all the pain that goes with having surgery. I ended up crying myself to sleep.... I was scared.