October Surgery Part One (The day before)

It seems like just yesterday I was blogging about T's BAHA magnet surgery.  It is hard to believe that her surgery happened over a month ago and that one week from today she will receive her new magnet hearing aid!

This post and surgery is actually not for T, but for M.

M is having surgery at Children's Hospital tomorrow afternoon at 2:45pm.  We scheduled the surgery  in late August so we have not had it on the horizon for too long. We were not anticipating this surgery, but will be glad to have it accomplished.  

This is not the first time M has had surgery.  He has already had two laparoscopic surgeries entering in through his bellybutton and abdomen.  Each of those surgeries were done when he was a toddler.   He had his tonsils out when he was in preschool and he remembers some not so fun parts of that recovery.  

This summer at his 10 year old check up I asked about surgery followup (from the toddler surgeries) and our general Dr. checked things out and referred us to the department at Children's who did the previous surgeries.  They determined that things didn't heal over time as they hoped so that an additional surgery would need to be done.  This surgery will also be a laparoscopic surgery with abdominal incisions.  There are some unknowns with this surgery.  This causes M some fear, but we know that we are in very good hands at Children's Hospital and with the Great Physician.  

Because M is 10 now and tummy incisions are not as visible as head incisions etc. we are keeping more of his surgery private.  He does want me to blog about it (in a general sense) and he is eager to pose for pictures tomorrow and probably hopeful that he will do funny things post-op just like his sister.  

The Dr. anticipates that his surgery will be about two hours in length.  He will then go to initial recovery and I will get to see him sometime around 6:00.  If all goes well we will be on our way home sometime around 8:00pm tomorrow night.  Day surgery recovery closes at 9:00pm,  so if surgery times end up delayed there is a chance we would have to stay overnight.  We are sure hoping  and expecting to come home.  We are going to bring plenty of food and cozy clothes just in case.  One thing that could delay our check out is waiting for his systems to wake up again.  Due to the nature of an abdominal surgery M will have a catheter so we will need to make sure his systems are working before heading home.  With the IV, juice, and popsicles hopefully that won't take too long.  

The tricky thing about having surgery as a 10 year old is that you don't get to have a nice 9:00am surgery.  Dr's generally schedule surgeries in order of age so M doesn't get to go in until 2:45.  We start pre-op stuff at 1:15.  We will probably leave our house around 12:05.  On one hand it will be nice for him to sleep in (The kids don't have school tomorrow, strategic surgery timing), but going all day without food will not be fun at all.  He has to stop solid foods at 5:15 and since he will be sleeping then he essentially has to stop solid foods tonight.  This means I am making his favorite lasagna tonight so he will have a hearty meal and a full belly going in to tomorrow.  He knows there are some liquids he can drink tomorrow and he is excited about having a blue Gatorade once T heads to a friend's house.  He has to stop liquids at 11:15 so we will need to do some distracting fun things to keep his mind off eating and drinking tomorrow morning.  

My parents got M a 1,000 piece puzzle just like T got on her surgery day.  He will open that tomorrow morning and hopefully enjoy putting it together tomorrow while we are waiting to head to Children's.  

I will update the blog tomorrow as I am able.  I will make sure to do a post after he is back in surgery and then once he is in recovery.  I might be pretty weary by the time we get home tomorrow night so the full recap might happen on Saturday morning.  

This surgery trip will look a bit different than our kids previous surgeries.  I am going to be taking M on my own tomorrow.  This way Brandon will be able to work.  T is going to spend the day with some family friends and then Brandon will be able to pick her up after work, be with her in the evening, and put her to bed at night.  I will really miss having Brandon there, but this makes the most sense.  Since there are no incisions happening millimeters from the brain I feel a lot more at peace about this procedure than I did for T's.  

Saturday could be interesting at our house. When we scheduled the surgery we didn't know the full extent of our our house's use on Sunday morning.  Because of renovations being done next door at church our house is hosting three children's Sunday school classes.  The one I teach meets in the basement.  We also have one in our kitchen and one in the family room and check in the entry area and games for the older two classes in the front room.  It is a hopping house and M's recovery might make Sunday prep tricky. I told Brandon that the carpets may go without vacuuming and that people probably won't even notice.  Our main focus will be on M's recovery and helping him to be comfortable.  

Because of some of the unknowns in the surgery, we are not sure what recovery will look like.  I will know a lot more tomorrow after the procedure.  

Please pray for: 

- Holy Spirit would calm fears before surgery

- M would manage going all day without food well

 - Successful and least invasive surgery and final surgery for this issue!

- Peace for me as I wait at Children's for Brandon as he works and T as she plays

- Speedy recovery with minimal pain and ability to sleep

- The God would be glorified through it all

Thank you for praying for us through this process. 

*We will be back to regular blog posts in a couple of days. *