Anesthesia Phobia

edit: Hello to all! Was doing better, so haven't been on in a few years, but this upcoming surgery is really setting off my anxiety, hence the post after so long. Well wishes to old friends & a hearty welcome to those who are new

I am totally freaking out! I was told that I have to have surgery to remove a staph-infested medical implant & I finally worked with my counselor to be okay enough to go through with that (I have PTSD flashbacks because I was violently sexually assaulted by a doctor in the medical office wing of a local hospital). I had been told by multiple doctors that they were sure the surgeon could do it with just local anesthesia. That made sense to me since the implant was put in with just local anesthesia. I would even be okay with regional anesthesia.

Then, I get a call today that my Wednesday surgery is scheduled to be done under general anesthesia so I tell them to check with the doctor because there must be some mistake. No, no mistake. He's refusing to do the surgery unless I get sedation & general anesthesia. I know rationally that I do dozens, if not hundreds, of things a day from taking a shower to eating peanut butter to driving a car that are WAY more likely to kill me, but that doesn't stop the horrible shaking that has taken over at the thought of the drugs. I'm not afraid of needles. For that matter, I'm not usually even afraid of dying. It's only dying in this particular way. And then the flashbacks start. And then the flashbacks morph into nighmares/day-mares where instead of it being a memory of the past, it is some made-up future issue where the new surgeon is attacking me, sometimes while I'm alive and other times after the anesthesia has killed me.

My neurologist tells me that I cannot put off this surgery, that the infected implant HAS to come out. She says if it doesn't come out this next week, I have a 20% risk of permanent paralysis & even risk of death, both of which will rapidly increase with each passing week. She said I do not have the option of postponing this surgery if I want to live and walk ever again, but I am shaking like a leaf. I am SOOOOOOOOOOO terrified. I try distracting myself, talking myself down & so forth to no avail.

I've tried to find a counselor that could maybe help me with this phobia, but have yet to find one. I'm told there is no proven treatment for sedation/anesthesia phobia. The most commonly recommended self-help product on the web is hypnosis. Unfortunately, I'm just as terrified of that. Always have been. I hated that part of magic shows even as a little kid. I would start crying. I hate the idea of someone else being in control of my body, someone else having control over whether I live or die. An anesthesiologist made a medical error when I was 5 years old that killed my grandfather as he was resting comfortably a week after his surgery & I've been afraid to trust someone with live & death matters ever since then.

Thinking I probably better call and cancel tomorrow before they bill me for cancelling on too short notice. Still don't know about what I'm going to do since this thing supposedly needs to come out. *sigh*

Post Edited (Tirzah) : 10/4/2014 12:46:05 AM (GMT-6)

Tell the doctors of your anxiety. Since this surgery must be done, pull out your coping skills, talk here and maybe get a medicine to help you with the anxiety you're having now.

This is def a trigger in your PTSD so while their may not be specific anesthesia phobia therapy, it's safe to say it's just part of PTSD & there is therapy for that.

Do tell your doctor about your issues and see if you can start therapy again to talk to a trained PTSD therapist.

You WILL get through this. I know it's very unpleasant but you must get this infected implant out. You'll feel better once it's done and you know infection isn't taking over. Anticipatory anxiety is just the pits but you can and will get through this. Do you have a family or friend who can go with you?

We are here to hold your hand & support you through this!!

Sending love-
Lisa

Thanks, all. Unfortunately, my mom has worse anxiety than mine. I told her she's not allowed to come with me any more because the last time she started hysterically crying "Please don't die on me, please don't die on me". It got so bad that the nurses had to carry her out and give her sedatives because she had such a severe anxiety attack.

I do have a trauma counselor for the PTSD & it's definitely gotten much better over the past 15 months since I started seeing her. I used to be too scared to even leave my home 98% of the time. A lot my early counseling sessions were by phone because I couldn't make it past the front door. Now I have my own home quilting business & go out for guild meetings, church, meeting with clients, counseling appointments, doctor's visits & lunch with friends without issue. I only get triggered when I'm in the hospital now and I am sure over time that will get better and better. I felt much better after I met with my state representative about changing the SA laws in my state so they're not so lenient for the criminals and she is going to have me testify about what I went through in the next legislative session.

It's just way extra hard in the hospital because normally we use "grounding" techniques like noticing what I see, hear, smell, feel so I know I'm not in the place where I was violated. In the hospital, the surrounding are more similar, so that adds to the struggle.

I do have an anxiety medication. I usually take it no more than once a month. I've been having a really hard time with this, though. On top of that, I cannot take any medicines at all (for pain or for anxiety) the day before surgery. The anxiety medicine is helping a little bit, but I got a spinal headache from the testing I had done on Thursday. Standard treatment for a spinal headache is a blood patch, but apparently I can't have one, so my doc told me to drink as much coffee as I could keep down. I told her that I have a bad allergy to caffeine & that it also exacerbates my anxiety, but she said I had to do it. I'm sure the caffeine is making things harder to cope with. I have hives all over my body & my face is red & swollen like a tomato. I can't breathe through my nose because of all the swelling, so my breathing exercises aren't working so well.

It just seems like so much is going wrong & that is definitely not helping me be optimistic about this whole thing. I sent my counselor a message, but she isn't responding. She rarely does. She specializes in PTSD, so she's been really helpful with that. She doesn't really get other anxiety disorders as much other than to diagnose them. I don't either. I know I sound crazy. I think about how my mom sounds when she's having an anxiety attack. I love her & I would do anything to help her (I wish I could get her to go for counseling), and I wish I could take all her stress away, but I also see that she doesn't make any sense when she gets like that. I'm sure that I likewise sound completely insane being so convinced that the sedation/anesthesia will definitely kill me. I don't meet the qualifications for a true "anxiety attack" because I never think my symptoms are a sign of something worse, but I get all the same physical symptoms as an anxiety attack -- shaking, sweats, nausea, dizziness, feeling faint, actually fainting, rapid breathing/pulse, cold hands and feet, extra heart beats (due to birth defect) plummeting blood sugar levels, and so forth.

I used to turn to my faith, but I've been questioning it a lot lately and that's adding to my fears because I worry where I'll go when I die. I just feel like, you know, I've been okay this far in my life without having this surgery so maybe I would be okay without it. Maybe the neurologist is wrong and if I give it some more time my body will fight off the infection -- or maybe it won't completely fight it off but it can keep it in balance like it's been for the last 4 years. Or maybe I could find a doctor to do a different procedure that didn't require anything other than local/regional anesthesia. All these thoughts just keep racing through my brain ... and that's while I'm on my anxiety med. I can't imagine what it'll be like once I have to quit taking it.

Sorry for crazy rant. Thank you all for your support. I really mean that. I am trying so hard to calm myself down & it's nice to at least be surrounded by some people that understand a little of what I'm going through.

Tell me again why you are supposed to drink coffee? It seems there is something else you could do/take for 2 very important reasons: A. You're allergic to caffeine & having an allergic reaction (a doctor would not tell a person allergic to peanuts to eat them! There's risk of anaphylaxis so I'm really puzzled with that one), and B. Caffeine is most definitely increasing your anxiety!

Can you take Benadryl or Claritan/some allergy medication? Benadryl would help the allergic reaction and may even quell some of your anxiety.

We are here for you!

Sending love-
Lisa

General Anesthesia is very scary before you go under. I usually have the anxiety a few days before and then on the actual day they make you wait so long in pre-op I'm usually just ready to get the whole thing over with.
My last time was the best. A took a xannax before I left for the hospital with the drs. OK. When they came to take me from pre-op to the operating room the anesthesiologist was with them and said I'm going to give you a little something to relax you and injected in the IV- I was like WOW! I feel great from head to toe! She said yes I'm the trip master today- you just relax and go with the flow. And that I did :). i grew up in the 70's by the way...

I wish you all the best, I feel like you are going to do fine.

PS - Also happy because my pain specialist doctor responded to message I sent him asking if there wasn't some alternative to caffeine. He said instead I could lay on my stomach for the next 48 hours & that would probably work even better. I don't know if it's working, but I definitely feel better. ;)

Yay. My pain specialist phoned me today & said that I am okay to take my normal pain meds the morning of surgery. :) That will definitely help some so I'm not dealing with horrible pain and withdrawals on top of everything else.

I also found out that I can refuse the pre-anesthesia sedation and just wait for the anesthesia itself. It doesn't impact the outcome. The sedation is just for the "comfort" of the patient & I don't have a good reaction to it anyways, so it'd be best to avoid it. I still don't know what all the surgeon is planning to do for this procedure & even though his receptionist is doing her best to run interference and make sure I don't get to talk to him, I don't think I'm comfortable going forward with things unless I can have 10 minutes of his time to find out what he's going to do while I'm out. I feel really guilty about being so pushy and insisting that he explain things to me, but I don't handle the unknown very well.

The doctor that put the implant in said if all else fails he's willing to take the infected implant out for me on Wednesday & can do it without sedation or general anesthesia. He's not a trained surgeon. All doctors go through some surgical training & he did go to some special certificate program about putting in/taking out this hardware, but that training didn't cover what to do with infections, open festering wounds & such. I know in general that having the special surgeon that's trained and experienced in dealing with infected wound sites would be a much better/safer option, but this coding for the wrong type of implant is the third error the receptionist has made -- that I've caught -- and I have no idea whether they're her errors or the surgeon's.

I am trying so hard to stay calm. My counselor has been in communication with me all day & is going to meet with me tomorrow. Hopefully she can help me make sense of all this. I feel so overwhelmed with everything going on.