I’ve been put under with gas and with an IV. It’s nothing - I mean, there’s not a hole in your memory, you just go from “10… 9…” to “when are you going to start?” I remember being confused because I’d just closed my eyes and the ceiling changed. I felt fine and couldn’t understand why they made me lie down all that time, and why on earth they made me leave in a wheelchair… and then my dad had to carry me in from the car.
I was put under for a hernia operation a few years ago. They wheeled me in to the OR, had me covered in nice warm blankets, and the anaesthesiologist came over and introduced himself. I didn’t have to count backwards, but he did ask me some questions like he was making small talk, and I’m pretty sure I just went out in the middle of a response. The next thing I knew I was waking up in recovery. It was like the best nap I’d ever had in my life.
It was basically like turning off a light, for me. The first surgery, I don’t even recall anything after beine wheeled through the pre-surgical prep area. I remember being rolled out of the cube, then I woke up. No nausea, no fear. Just wobbly. And they sort of rushed me out, because it was a same-day surgery center (gallbladder removal) and I was one of the last patients. The second surgery, I remember being moved fromt he gurney to the operating table. I remember thinking how small and bright the operating room was, nothing like on TV. Then I was in recovery. I had to stay in the recovery area for 6 hours, while patients came and went, because the surgeon was afraid I might hemorrage and she wanted me watched closer and longer than usual. I had one shot of pain med in my IV, and before they were going to move me, I was ready for more pain meds. The nurse said I’d get some when I got to my room. When I got there, the floor nurses said the surgeon wouldn’t approve anything in my IV, and I had a pill to swallow. Only I’d just had my thyroid removed, it’d been much more involved than they were expecting, and I couldn’t swallow a pill to save my life. So I never had any pain meds after the recovery room. But no nausea or confusion (that I remember) from the anesthesia.
StG
It is fantastic if you have had a bad, sleepless week full of labwork and stress …
The only thing I didnt like was being cold as you are only given a sheet while on the gurney for being rolled to pre-op. I HATE being cold!
The nothingness is fascinating. I didnt get any pre op sedation, I dont get nervous. Once was gas induced, 4 times IV induced. Mainly I get a count backwards from 100 and get to 98 
and then I pop awake coherent and ravenously hungry, and freezing my ass off to the point of the whole electric blanket thing because I am shivering hard enough to pretty much need rails to keep from falling off the bed because I have no coordination and am shaking like you would not believe. That phase seems to last about 15 minutes, then I am fine. Pretty much 45 minutes to an hour and I was pushed out and into the room until the doc came in and cleared me - mrAru always brings me something to eat and drink because I detest apple juice, sprite and fruit cup. I prefer iced tea and chicken nuggets… the time I was in having a tumor removed, the nurse came in to see if I thought i would like to try to eat and drink something I was half way through a 20 piece mcnuggets and a supersized iced tea. Of course I pretty much hadnt eaten for about 3 days [they kept running me through radiology and diagnostics, and everything was pretty much dont eat , do this prep kit, and sit around here until it is too late to actually get something to eat before you hit the nothing by mouth time :mad: damn navy hospitals - hurry up and wait.
Odd thing is I just had a parathyroid out in October, and did the PT sedation for it [the Doc wanted me awake, and the gas passer told horrible jokes, but we had good conversation about other stuff - we were both SF readers and discussed favorite authors and series. ] On that one I believe I had versed IV just before the kickoff because I really dont remember my neck being shot up with the local, just sort of chatting with people, and an occasional tugging feeling makign it through, and an occasional twinge when it was time for more lido to be placed. I got the chills and shakes just about the time the were taking the sterile fields down, and having about 4 warmed blankets piled on me until I got to recovery when I got teh electric blanket. 45 minutes later the surgeon came in and released us. Took about 30 minutes to finish getting signed out, the chair and the car retrieved from parking.
I was knocked out with IVs. No pain, no panic, no fear. The anesthetist said, “OK, I am going to put you to sleep now”, he shot the stuff into the IV line, and I said to myself “Gee, my arm feels cold” and I was in recovery.
Don’t worry about it. It is, rather literally, nothing.
Regards,
Shodan
In the past 20 years, I’ve had general anesthesia more than a dozen times. Here’s how my experiences have been, and what I’ve learned:
- I’ve had gas-induced (they put the mask over your mouth, tell you to count backwards from ten, I never make it past 7) and IV induced; the meds they put in the IV burn, if it’s in a small vein. I could feel it moving up my vein, as if someone had lit a match, blown it out, and was running the still-burning-hot match head up my arm; but it doesn’t burn for long, because then I’m out. Whichever type they use (and more recently, it’s all been IV), they put an oxygen mask over my mouth and nose for a few minutes prior to knocking me out, to “oxygenize” me.
- Relaxing drugs. Some anesthesiologists seem to give this as a matter of course. With others, if you want something, ask. If you do want something (Versed is the most common, though it does nothing for me, many, many people like it a lot), and the anesthesiologist doesn’t mention it, just inquire.
- Passage of time doesn’t seem to exist for me when I’m under. It’s like someone found my “off switch”.
- Waking up in the recovery room, the nurse always asks if I’m in pain, and if I’m nauseated. I usually am in pain, so that’s a no-brainer. But even if I’m not nauseated, I tell her I am. I’ve thrown up from general anesthesia before, it’s nasty, and I’d rather head it off at the pass. I generally request Zofran, as the other frequently used anti-nausea, Phenergan, is a narcotic antagonist, and means the nice shot of morphine she just gave me won’t work as well.
- I’m always cold when I wake up too. I’ve found it best to be very direct. Instead of just saying “I’m cold” I’ll say “Could I have a couple of blankets, please? I’d prefer the heated kind if you’ve got them”, and instead of saying “My throat’s awfully dry”, I’ll say “Would you check and see when I can have some ice chips?” (though they usually won’t give you ice chips until your nausea is under control).
- As for your alcohol consumption, the anesthesiologist will ask you about this before sedating you. Be honest with him (or her; most are men, but I’ve had a few women, too). Be honest about the idea that you might be more resistant to anesthesia because you drink pretty frequently. I have one friend, a tiny thing, who’s always afraid they’re not going to give her enough anesthetic, and when they ask her weight her default response is “300 pounds”!
Be aware and reassured that the anesthesiologist and doctors have lots of sophisticated equipment designed to tell them if you’re under deeply enough for them to proceed.
Best of luck!
Last time I had it, I remember feeling very relaxed and heavy and cold as I went out (the coldness might have just been a cool operating room). I got a shot to get me going on the way to sleepytown, and then the real stuff in the operating room. When I woke up, I was back in my hospital room and I felt completely awake and talked very excitedly to my parents who had arrived from out of town at the hospital while I was in surgery. But after a few short minutes I felt exhausted and fell back asleep for some time. I puked once after my first post surgery meal. I also had a inhaler treatment as my asthma was bothering me. But after the one puke and my lungs cleared up, I felt as normal as I could be, given my abdominal surgery.
I was put under for my wisdom teeth extraction a few years back. I remember them putting the mask on me, and they told me to count backwards from 100. I got to about 97 and giggled, for some reason, and then got to 96…
And then they were asking me if I could stand up and walk out to the recovery room. The time spent during the surgery is just gone- it’s actually kind of creepy if you think about it.
I agree, so I try not to think about it! 
Seriously, it is kind of creepy; I told my husband once, “they call it ‘putting you to sleep’, but it’s not like sleep. It’s more like being temporarily dead”. But I try not to think about it because when I need surgical procedures, I need surgical procedures.
I did used to worry about that whole “conscious during anesthesia” thing. But I voiced my concern to my urologist, who pointed out that, by that time, I’d been “under” probably a half-dozen times, and if that was going to happen, it would have already happened. That relaxed me about that. Plus, they really do have more sophisticated monitoring equipment now that’s supposed to be able to tell them when you’re really ‘under’ and when you’re just paralyzed!
I see some folks remarking how freezing it is in surgery. That was the case for me - it felt like you could chill beer in there. I asked the nurse how she could stand working in such cold, and she said I was just feeling it more because I was sick (I was having an inflamed gall bladder out). Then she got a blanket out of a heating closet and put it over me. I guess the fact that I was lying there virtually naked might have had something to do with feeling freezing, too.
I was under for 6 1/2 hours. 
I remember very little of falling asleep, and like with others here, after the operation I didn’t feel as though the op had taken any time at all.
It wasn’t pleasant after that though. It felt quite literally like someone had been stamping on my head. And I was so disoriented that apparently I kept trying to pull my IV cables out, and they eventually put a cast around them to prevent me doing that.
The op had been in the afternoon, and I think I flipped throughout the evening between half hours of vivid dreaming and half hours of being awake. The following morning I thought several days had passed, and my mother had to inform me that it was just the next day.
As part of the operation, they had to stop my heart briefly. I don’t recall any NDE.
I was put out when I had my wisdom teeth out. Getting put under was fine. It was like. . .I was sitting there, they put the IV in (my very first IV), and I remember thinking, “hey, this doesn’t really hurt so b–”
Nothing. I came out slowly, though. I don’t think they were done when I started coming too, but I was numbed and still really out of it, so that didn’t bother me. I was, however, INCREDIBLY disoriented and groggy for a while, which upset me to bawling tears (I have a thing about control, and I couldn’t express what I was thinking. THAT scared me). But, other than that. . .it really wasn’t a big deal.
I’m with the “10, 9, where the hell am I?” crowd.
I do have one question though: For those of you who went under for surgery that didn’t require transportation by gurney, did you lose anytime beyond that actually spent in surgery? When I had my wisdom teeth out, I went from the countdown to sitting up in a different chair, way down the hall by the office’s back door, with no memory of walking/being walked from one place to the other, or of being left there, or any parting instructions the doctor or nurse might have given me. Has anyone else’s black-out period included time during which he or she was actually (albeit barely) up and about?
I’ve been out twice, once when half my thyroid was removed and once, recently, when they tried to reboot my heart. The second time used an IV. I was out like a light. No barfing problems, but you are supposed to fast after midnight. The first time they used far more anesthesia than the second. I woke in the hospital bed, and was out of it for a few hours, drifting in and out of sleep. The second time I was an outpatient, the anesthesia was light, and I was ready to go minutes after I woke up.
My wife has been know to fight it and for saying nasty things to the doctors as she goes under, but I’m much more polite.
And Staggerlee - 
I had surgery to correct a deviated septum a few years ago. Originally I was told that it would be done as out-patient surgery with just a local anesthetic, but after I got to the hospital it was decided to use a general and keep me overnight because of my sleep apnea (which was how it was discovered that I needed the surgery. One minute I was in the prep room with a needle in my arm and the next thing I knew I was in a hospital room with my nose packed with gauze and my throat and mouth as dry as the Sahara. I have no recollection of having been told to count, or even that they were about to put me under.
About a year after that I had a colonoscopy and they decided to put me under for that too. As far as I can remember, I was just given a shot which put me to sleep, and the next thing I knew I was in the recovery room.
This may have something to do with the relaxation meds that a lot of anesthesiologists use. Versed (which as I’ve mentioned has no effect on me) is sometimes called an “amnesia” drugs. This is one of the reasons it’s used. It tends to produce “black outs” in the time between when it is given and sometime after coming back to consciousness.
I’ve heard many, many stories of people who remember nothing in between the time they were given their “happy juice” and the time they woke up in their hospital room.
snerk
The last time I was put out was for tooth extractions. When I came out of it I was weepy as hell. I just could NOT stop crying, and I rarely cry normally! That lasted for a good 15 minutes…I felt like a fool.
Sorry to be the party pooper but since you asked I had a very bad experience under general anesthesia. I was conscious, paralyzed, in heavy pain, suffocating and panicking. To add insult to injury everybody talked down to me about the experience as if I had dreamed the whole thing when I was at my most vulnerable suffering from post-op complications from a relatively simple surgery.
I also found out how doctors can be more concerned with covering each others ass than patient care. All in all, a very traumatic experience. Thankfully I’m in the minority.
So, it seems from this thread that the heavy majority had no ill-experience, almost a jump in time, while others had some complications all the way down to your hellish experience.
I guess it is just a combination of all of the factors including the type of drug, body chemistry, the doctor, etc.
But Pedro, couldn’t they test whether or not it was a dream? If you were awake the whole time, couldn’t you describe things that you couldn’t possibly have known or dreamt about? A particular statement the surgeon made?
Thanks again, everyone…
My only experience with general anesthesia was when I broke my arm when I was eleven. I recall having both arms extended, one broken, the other for anesthesia. I recall being asked to count backward from 100. I recall a microsecond where I was confused and thought my other arm was broken. I believe I got to 96 in my counting. The next thing I remember was being in recovery. As some have mentioned, I did not have a sense of time passing, no dreaming, no awareness or consciousness.