Day 2 After Lung Surgery – If It isn't Cancer, It Must Be…

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So when we parted ways yesterday I was screaming from the pain of having a chest tube removed. (If you missed yesterday’s post just click to read it – it will only take a minute and things will make more sense that way.)
So the chest tube was removed. Just thinking about it now makes me shudder, it was so awful. I cried for literally about 30 minutes after that was finished. I was finally somewhat coherent, and could actually get out a sentence. I finally was able to understand and process what had been done and what they felt happened. so here it is.
When the surgeon opened me up, he too smelled the smell I mentioned. He cleared out a bunch of nasty and ended up having to remove one of the lobes of my left lung. He was pretty sure what was going on wasn’t cancer, and he was sure that there was massive infection. What he felt (feels) happened is that somehow I had been aspirating food into my lungs – associated with the night coughing no doubt. The food rotted – causing that nasty smell and the infection. When I asked what could possibly have caused this, I wasn’t prepared for the answer, or what the answer might mean for me.
The surgeon told me that he felt somehow something wonky (my word, not his) had happened and my Lap band had become too tight, in turn causing the food to come back and then aspirated. This didn’t make any sense to me, since I had achieved my final goal weight of 175 in the beginning of 2011 and hadn’t had a fill in well over six months. He had no other explanation. He told me, as well as Dr Hottie by telephone, that my Lap band had to be emptied immediately.
The next day, still 149 pounds, I was released to go home. I felt like I was playing Monopoly with my life and I’d been told I could not pass go. I was instructed not to go directly home. Instead, I was to go directly to Dr Hottie’s office.
More tomorrow.