Tracking Medicines Post-Surgery

This is a purely practical post.  I had no idea how many medicines I would be taking after I got home from the hospital.  There are the medicines you take to treat your condition, and then there are the medicines you take to balance out the negative effects of the medicines that treat your condition.  I probably took three or four laxatives for several weeks.  I took Pepcid.  I had an oxycodone prescription, that sadly I had to use.  I had dexamethasone (a steroid that reduces swelling in your head and face).  I had an anticonvulsant.  I had acetaminophen.  After three weeks I had ibuprofen.  So many medicines.  And my brain wasn't working quite right to keep track of them all.

So here is your practical tip if you have to undergo brain surgery--get a blank notebook and write down every time you take medicine.  Your will feel like your bedroom is a pharmacy for awhile.  It may take months, but eventually you won't have to take so many medicines and you won't have to write them down.  But at the beginning, write them down.

It's helpful to know when you took your last set of pills, but another benefit of writing down all your medicines is that you will be able to see when your pain was better or worse over time.  My pain levels fluctuated, and I liked being able to look back and figure out what was going on with my body. 

Apparently people can come away from brain surgery with terrible headaches for up to a year (or forever).  I thought it was helpful to have my medicine list as a record of my pain.  I took oxycodone very sparingly and after a month or so I took it back to a local pharmacy that provides medicine disposal.  But I liked being able to distinguish when I was taking oxy versus acetaminophen versus ibuprofen, especially when I was living from one dose of pain meds to another. 

For about two and a half months I feared that I would never be off pain meds.  And then one night I woke up with terrible heartburn, and I worried that maybe taking so much Tylenol was hurting my system, so I cut back at lot.  Thankfully at that point my head healed enough that I didn't need to take so much, and by about three months post-surgery I was not taking any pain medicine regularly.  If this happens to you too, don't worry.  Your head takes a long time to heal, and you will probably get headaches more frequently after surgery.  It's okay, and it's okay to take medicine to keep you going when you need it.  Just be sure to ask your doctor before taking any new medicines.  You never know what type of adverse reactions could occur in your unique position.