One Heck of a Week, and it is only Tuesday

This is what the baby looked like this morning. He didn't question us when we fed him Grape Flavored Pedialite for breakfast, instead of oatmeal. He didn't bat an eye when his next meal was apple juice. He didn't seem to know what was coming. We left for the Hospital to have his Surgery (Hypospadias Repair- for a longer explanation see post from early January titled "Calling all Angels") at 10 AM, he fell asleep in the car. When we checked in at 10:45 he was so happy and smiley that all the clerks at Same Day Surgery had to look at him. They like kids who smile.

"No photos, Please" he said to the "Pop"arazzi as he was changed into his Hospital Pajamas. He was so affable when the Nurse was doing his presurgery exam that she decided that he wouldn't need any extra medication to calm him down before his surgery, apparently a lot of kids do.

The doctor came and saw us, he expected the surgery to take about 1 hour and 15 minutes. The Anesthesiologist came by a few minutes later to take the baby back to the OR. We introduced him to the new Doctor, handed him over, gave goodbye kisses and then watched our extremely happy baby be walked away. As he went down the long hallway he continued to smile at the Doctor, and then he started to checkout his surroundings- the smile on his face got even bigger. An hour into his surgery I suddenly had the impression that it wasn't his surroundings that he was smiling at, it was his angel friends who had come to help him- and me- through this day.

The Surgery ended up taking 2 hours. About 15 minutes after meeting with the Surgeon, I was allowed into the Post Anesthesia Care Unit (PACU). When I arrived at the babies bed he was surrounded by adoring nurses and the Anesthesiologist. They had some scary news for me. Yes the Surgery had gone well, but Recovery was not going as planned. The baby had an adverse reaction to the Anesthesia and was not breathing well. At the time he arrived in the PACU he was actually turning blue, his Oxygen level was in the 40's, they gave him oxygen and it quickly rose to the high 80's, but it would not stay up unless the oxygen mask was near by. He could not go home until his Oxygen level was above 90% and stayed that way with out the oxygen mask. There was a good chance that he would need to be observed overnight if this didn't happen in the the next two hours.

It took about 1 and a half hours to get the oxygen levels above 90 without the mask. You can see the mask on Ken's lap as he holds the baby, we kept moving it farther and farther away until we knew his levels had stabilized without it. He slept in our arms for most of that time. He also had to prove to the nurse that he could keep clear liquids down. He didn't want anything to do with the apple juice the nurses had given him and it took a while, but eventually the nurse let us feed him some formula (not a clear liquid). He inhaled the formula- he was hungry! Twenty minutes later, as the nurse was preparing to discharge him, he threw up all the formula, (I wished I had brought myself an extra set of clothes). About an half hour later he decided that maybe juice wasn't so bad, especially if it was in his bottle and not the hospital bottle that he had been given to start with. He kept that down for a half an hour and we were discharged home. He started to act like his old self, escaping while we changed his diaper and put his clothes on- the nurse thought that was a hoot. But as you can see from this picture- he was still quite medicated.We got home at 6:45 PM. Glad not to have to spend the night at Primary Children's. Grateful for Angels who entertain and calm our baby- He didn't cry, Seriously, as several of the nurses put it, he was "Mellow". Now the fun starts, Recovery! He will be Cranky for a couple of days and will be bruised and swollen for a week or more. I am certain his parents will be sleep deprived for a couple of days, but in the end, all will be well.

Thanks for your prayers and support, your love and care for our family means so much to us. We are lucky to have such great friends and family. I will Post a picture of My Sweet Babies Smile again, as soon as I take one!