How to prepare for surgery: 5 easy steps to help your body win

Surgery of any kind, whether on a bone or an internal organ, is an unnatural and unsettling experience. It needs to be embraced and accepted as such.
I’d know: I have one of my own rib bones filling my cheek and nose, a dead person’s bone in my right foot, and a leg/femur bone that was biologically tricked to re-grow into place (straight or “correctly”), to name a few examples.
There are easy steps you can take to prepare — steps that drastically improve my state of mind before, during, and after surgery and, most crucially, decrease how much time I spend physically recovering from surgery.
It is okay to be nervous. It is okay to be unsure. It is not okay to be unprepared.
You are biologically pre-wired to fight or flight.
Newsflash: You will not be able to take flight from a surgery, no matter how much you may want to.
Deep down, you know this. So, instead, prepare to win — to annihilate — the fight.
Your doctors already told you what to do to prepare your body: I’m here to tell you how to best prepare everything else.
The reality if you’re having surgery is that a medical team will be invading your body. Yes, that’s right, I said invading. Preparing for surgery should be taken as seriously and attended to as meticulously as if you were preparing your body for battle. Surgery, after all, is a fight.
This is the magic of surgery: you can’t control much, but you can control how you choose to prepare as an individual. You can control every moment up until the IV goes into your arm and the life-saving nurses wheel you away to the OR.
Okay, I have to mention it: you can get mad and ignore that you’re going into surgery— but I can promise you that reaction won’t do anything to help the procedure or, more importantly, the recovery go any better.
Instead, channel that anger and frustration you’re feeling into every last ounce of planning for what you can control as you prepare to surrender your physical being to a team of extremely talented, smart medical professionals.
So, here are my personal five steps to prepare for surgery.
Step 1. Believe in the strength of your body.
“Imagine there’s a flame burning in the pit of your stomach, and, no matter what, don’t let the flame go out until you see your parents staring at you in the POST OP room.”
This is what a social worker at Shriner’s Hospital for Children told me when I was 8 years old and about to be wheeled into an operating room.
It’s the singular, most-effective piece of advice I’ve received for how to visualize success before surgery.
Fires continue on their own — relentlessly burning until forcibly put out by other modes of matter.
Imagining that your body is capable of such power is crucial to a successful surgery. Believe in the unwavering strength of your body to keep burning — to keep on fighting — even when you’re not consciously there to tell it to do so.
Step 2. Separate your mind and body.
This step probably sounds confusing, but I’ve found it’s the most effective for controlling the emotional side effects (i.e. feeling scared) of surgery.
Before surgery, I use painting (drawing or writing work as well) to process a clear separation of my mind and body.
For the duration of the surgery and the recovery, it is essential to imagine that your mind is with you no matter what — regardless of the pain or agony your body may be putting you through.
No matter what scalpels touch your body or what doctors and nurses do while you’re asleep, it is of the utmost importance to never, ever forget that your mind is STILL with you. The real you.
Your mind in surgery is all that stays with you — and it is stronger than any flimsy body part undergoing improvement.
Draw out where your mind will go, either figuratively or literally, on a canvas or piece of paper. I enjoy drawing my ‘safe space’ — a space where I send my mind while my body is otherwise under the knife.
My safe space is mine, so I can’t tell you the specifics….but it involves a field, a lake, and a variety of individual items that I can’t live without. Items that bring back positive memories or items that I’ve cherished since I was a kid.
Picture the space that you draw or paint is the space where your mind goes as it separates from your body the minute the anesthesia enters your blood stream.
If you want to, you can even put this painting or drawing next to your bed to remind you as you recover. I like to secretly hide mine under my pillow and pull it out, as needed.
Your body will be undergoing pain and trauma both during and after surgery, but your mind can remain in its happy place — its safe space— away from that pain and trauma.
Your mind will know when to rejoin the body — when it is safe to do so — usually when you are substantially through recovery and coming off the terribly foggy pain meds.
Remember after the surgery not to force your mind back fully until it feels right — just know that the reunion will happen.
Step 3. Let someone else do the talking! Blare that music.
Music is the only thing I cannot be without in the moments counting down to surgery (sorry Mom & Dad…).
No matter what a nurse or doctor asks me to do in the moments leading up to surgery, I always kindly request that I keep my headphones in until the last possible minute.
When my emotions are too much to process, it’s simply easier to go numb and let someone else do the talking — the singing.
The singing, however, needs to be the right voice. The voice you’ve prepared on a preset playlist.
In my case, my music of choice before surgery centers on inspirational and motivational voices. Kanye West’s “Stronger” and Gloria Gaynor’s “I Will Survive” are 100% the only reason I can politely smile at a doctor in the PRE OP room as she proceeds to draw with sharpie on areas of my bone that are about to be slashed apart.
If you’re in need of a good playlist, here’s one of my recent pre-op surgery playlists.
Make a playlist and keep it on non-stop the night before and the morning of surgery. Keep those powerful voices in your head. Forcibly block out any other bad vibes.
When all else fails, just force your mind to do absolutely no work. Remember, it’s separate from your body now. Repeat the lyrics over and over again. The lyrics will get you through.
Step 4. Prepare your family and friends.
No matter how many times I’ve gone into surgery, the recovery is never self-explanatory for my family — who I should acknowledge as my extremely gracious, loving and kind caregivers.
It’s difficult to remember, but, from what I’ve been told, watching someone you love go through surgery is often just as tough as going through it.
My favorite activity to do before a surgery is prepare a personalized guide for my family and friends who have generously volunteered to help me through the recovery. This ensures that no matter how ‘out of it’ you are on pain meds or in pain, you will be in a good environment that will help you heal more quickly.
The parts of my surgery guide vary from surgery to surgery, but here’s two examples.
- Administer pain medicine that should be taken every 4 hours every 3 hours and 45 minutes instead. The medicine needs 15 minutes to kick in. Waiting the full four hours will result in a decent spike in pain for the 15–20 minutes that it takes for the pain medicine to re-kick in.
- Provide food with pain meds, even if initially refused. Favorite foods to slyly use if I say I’m not hungry or don’t want to eat: ice cream, Peach Pleasure from Jamba Juice or yellow Gatorade.
Most importantly, however, it’s essential to warn your family in your guide of how you may (improperly) behave after surgery amid the pain, frustration, and, of course, the haze of meds. This requires really sitting down and reflecting on the moments in the past when you’ve become unnecessarily agitated. Yes, we all have them. You do too.
Included in each of my “Caring for Lynsey Post-Surgery” guides, I point out that I hate being alone and in isolation, but also hate it when people see me crying in pain (even my family).
I kindly request that my caregiver periodically check in, but not necessarily hover or stay in the room too much. If I’m going to scream in pain or squeeze a pillow, I’d really like to do it alone — and that rule extends to my Mom.
Know yourself and take the time to reflect and consider what you will need afterwards to help your body focus on healing.
REMEMBER: You likely won’t have your mind on your side if you’re on pain meds, so the more you can put in writing, the better.
Step 5. Set milestones.
This is important, but also difficult given the unpredictability of surgery recovery.
It is good to set a marker of what you will consider “success” or, rather, multiple points of progress on the road to recovery. This will give you something to look forward to amid the pain and monotony of healing.
For my last foot surgery, I set my first major milestone as being able to go to the bathroom by myself. It took me two weeks (which was far longer than my goal of 3 days), but, once I made it to that milestone, I knew I was truly going to be okay. Crossing it off on paper felt great!
This sounds like a silly step, but it will keep you positive and upbeat going through the inevitable ups and downs of recovery.
When all else fails, just remember: you got this.
Very few things are in your control when it comes to undergoing surgery, but it’s important to exhaust the list of things you can control. If you make the effort to put your mind in the right state, your body will follow.
There’s no reason to back away from a fight you know you can win. And, if you prepare, your body is pre-determined to win your upcoming surgery.
Thanks for reading! This article is intended for children, teens or adults living with arthrogryposis. Arthrogryposis is a congenital, genetic disease that impacts joint and bone mobility.
Any other helpful tips on how to prepare for surgery? Feel free to share in the comments section below.
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