June 27, 2010
UAB Surgery Update
We arrived in Birmingham on Monday morning for K's pre-op appointment with Dr. Wellons, which led to a series of other stops here at the hospital, pre-admissions, and lab work being done. First thing we found out was that K's surgery had been moved to Wednesday morning at 7:30 am rather than Tuesday due to an emergency case coming in. It was a little frustrating but I am glad we did not have it Tues afternoon, because it would have made for a very very long day. So bright and early Wednesday morning we were here at Children's Hospital (early as in 5 am!) and thankfully was one of the 1st called back. Once we got back to the pre surgery room, we spoke with the drs and such and answered questions about K etc and then they took her off to get drugged up. Surgery was expected to start soon after but it was 8:30 before it got started, and they told us about 3 to 4 hours. True to their word, right about 12:30 we found out the surgery was complete and was successful. The staff was great on updating us every hour to hour and half on surgery and K's status.
She had to spend a couple hours in recovery while we waited on a room and bed to be available and it wasn't until about 4pm we got to the room and they finally brought her in. It was so great to see her, I was really worried she would be hooked up to all these things but she only had her IV in. The worst part not being able to hold her. Dr Wellons came and talked to us right before we got the room and told us how everything went and thankfully he did not have to detach any nerves during the detethering. She still had movement in her hips, knees and ankles as before. He did have to leave a smaller version of the "hump" aka cyst so that the nerves would remain intact and everything would heal properly. So she's had to be flat since surgery, on her stomach or on her side with no one picking her up. We've had to feed her while she's on her side and change her diaper with her on her stomach. We've gotten used to that, but it still sucks to not pick your baby up when all you want to do is comfort her.
Overall she's doing well post-op with the exception of bladder control. She's unable to really urinate right now, could be the nerves are just irritated and swollen or it could be a side affect that she has to live with. I am hoping for the first and hope it resumes normal functions soon. Right now she has to be cathed every 4 hours and boy are the nurses having a hard time. She's so small and swollen it makes it quite difficult and to think we are going to have to do this at home, sigh. I hope it's just short term, so please say a quick prayer on that.
We are waiting to find out if we are able to leave tomorrow (Monday) to come home. Dr Wellons wants us to pick her up and hold her as we do at home to check for spinal fluid leaks in her incision area. So far so good on that, so if all goes well we'll be able to return home. I am ready, the girls are ready for us to be home as well. I'll try to update with more info later this week after we get home and settled.
Thank you for all the well wishes, thoughts and prayers for baby K and our family.
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