I’m going under general for the first time in two weeks for a brain biopsy.
Explain it and how it’s safe.
I’m not scared of the biopsy, just the general.
Is that normal?
In: 90
I just had my first IV anesthesia (wisdom teeth) two hours ago. It’s really scary (I was sweating) before it as you don’t know what’s going to happen, but you kind of don’t every realize you’re falling asleep. It felt like I blinked and I was done. No pain, nothing (honestly the swelling of my mouth hurts more than anything rn)
Maybe this response isn’t what ur looking for but hopefully it brings you some calm.
Don’t lie to your anesthesiologist. Seriously. Not about how much you smoke drink or even over the counter meds. Your real risks, unknown interactions, or unknown allergies.
I had recently gone under and truth be told, I was scared witless. The doctors could tell and made a point of lightening up the mood a bit, which I really appreciated. All people involved were very gentle and truth be told, the anticipation leading up to it was the worst part. Then its a light jab in the wrist whilst making conversation with the doctor. The doctor even reassured me that he has done the procedure thousands of times. After a while, they just told me “good night” and i was off in like 3 seconds afterwards. It was painless, just a pleasantly warm feeling spreading thoughout my body. After that, its like a teleport, you wake up thinking you fell asleep a second ago, you dont have the normal sensation of time passing that you do when asleep, I found that pretty funny.
Tell the anesthesiologist every drug you take and how much. Don’t worry about illegal drugs because they would rather you be honest instead of having an issue.
First time round it’s a bit of a worry.
Subsequently I have looked forward to dipping out of life for a few hours.
sure, anxiety about it is ‘normal.’ You are putting your life in the hands of others. But I’ve had general anesthesia about 10 times and I almost look forward to it because it’s such a fascinating experience.
In the pre operating room you will get into your gown and nurses and doctors will stop in your area and ask you a ton of questions. You get hooked up to an IV and they may give you medicine that will make you feel incredibly relaxed.
When it’s time for surgery they will wheel your bed into the OR room, you will shift to the very cold OR bed, and they will give you a very warm and soft blanket. There might be a few minutes of doctors and nurses futzing about, and then the anesthetist will tell you the sleeping medicine is on its way in. You will get super drowsy FAST. Like in a few seconds. And you fall asleep.
Then comes the crazy part. It will feel like 1 second passes and your eyes start opening. and you hear the voices of the doctors and nurses. You will feel groggy for maybe 3 minutes and then you will be back to how you were when you got there. It’s possible that the meds will have a calming effect on you for the hour after surgery. I get more talkative than I usually am.
Anesthesia resident physician here.
Your brain has On and Off signals (or wake and sleep) firing at all times. When you’re doing your normal daytime stuff, it’s like 90% On signals, 10% Off signals. When you sleep, it’s flipped.
What we do for anesthesia is use medications that tell your brain to fire more and more Off signals until you’re fully anesthetized. These medications keep making the brain fire Off signals to override the On signals generated by surgeons/proceduralists poking you. Then we help out by managing any other bodily functions that also got turned off by our ramping up the Off signals (breathing, regulating temperature, etc).
When the surgeons are done, we turn off the medications and slowly the On signals again outnumber the Off signals in your brain and you wake up!
But yes, be honest and thorough when answering the anesthesiologist’s questions pre op. We need to know what your body looks like a baseline so we know how best to manage it when it needs the help.
Happy to answer questions. 🙂
I worked in pre surgical services a lifetime ago and supported a team of anesthesiologists. They saw high risk patients weeks before surgery to make sure they got the green light. These guys (and gals) go to school at least TWELVE years before they are solely responsible for keeping patients alive. It’s a truly specialized profession. The experience as a patient is scary the 1st time bc of the unknown but it’s over in the blink of an eye and you remember nothing.
At my age (60s), I’ve had more than a few procedures requiring propofol and 4 generals. I like to watch the propofol (milk of amnesia) being pushed and try to force myself to remain conscious. I have yet to win that battle. With the generals, I just went in there, fell asleep, woke up a few seconds later, and realized that hours had passed. Every. Single.Time. Anesthesia is a wonderful thing.
I don’t have any words for you, explaining the anesthesia, but I do have a few words for you coming from someone that has 32 brain surgeries with no telling how many in the future. Depending on the approach that your surgeon is going to do, if you have long hair, you should be able to comb your hair in a way that will cover where they buzz part of your hair. If you are staying overnight in the hospital, bring a long charging cable and power source for your phone.
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