It’s Wednesday July 3, 2013 and today is our latest scheduled date for Hudsons surgery. We are a bit anxious to say the least since we have already been bumped twice and we are frequently hearing other parents at the House saying beds and nurses are not available. Nonetheless, we follow the instructions that are given from pre-admission. We bathe him 3 times with surgical soap and we arrived at the hospital at 9:30am not having food since midnight. Chris and I didn’t have time to get breakfast in the morning neither. Hudson is not allowed to have any fluids since surgery was scheduled for 11:40am.
The nurse confirms his identity and puts a bracelet on his wrist and we’re thankful his separate blood bank ankle bracelet stayed on for the entire week, otherwise he would have had to be poked again. 11:40 rolls around and now he’s asking for water because he’s so thirsty, but unfortunately he can’t have anything. After about an hour of waiting, we hear the people next to us being told that their surgery has to be postponed due to lack of beds and nurses! Needless to say those parents were not happy whatsoever and I don’t blame them. Now we start to get a bit edgy, grumpy, being hungry and annoyed because we have been waiting in a small room for what seems to be forever without any status updates. It’s around 12:00pm, about 2.5hours after we arrived, a nurse came to talk to us and said, “Dr. Rebeyka say’s it’s a go and yes, there is a bed available.” PHEWWW!!! But there still always the possibility of being bumped again even if Hudson was being prepped in the OR. It’s 12:30 and Dr. Rebeyka comes to finally talk to us on what he plans to do to Hudson’s heart. He seems very confident that everything will go smoothly and does not expect any problems since he’s going in very healthy. He says he will also try to repair his Tricuspid valve that currently has a mild-to-moderate leak and also reconstruct his aortic arch to widen it. This is good because Dr. Rebeykah had done the original repair during his Glenn operation. Chris mentions to me that Dr. Rebeykah makes it sound so easy like he’s fixing a car! And lastly of course, the main reason we are here, the Fontan procedure which is re-routing his blood flow. (Chris likes to know every detail so he can write more on this operation sometime). Dr. Rebeykah say’s that he should see Hudson in the OR around 1:00. Another hour passes and we are starting to want to scream at someone because we have been there since 9:30 waiting and the anxiousness, thinking of the possibility of being bumped again being so late in the day, is eating at us. Finally, 2:00 they get a call to take him up and gown him up. He’s wheeled in and Chris wants to go with him into OR. Chris has been putting together video of Hudson’s Journey since he was born and wants to be able to record him going into the OR. It was really hard for me at this time to let him go and see him be wheeled off into Operating Room. It’s like I know I should let go, but it’s so hard to give him up. One thing that was so reassuring in my heart was that when I asked him who was going to be beside him when he has his surgery. His response was, “Jesus!” I am so proud of my boy to know he’s not going alone and that there is also an army of people praying for him and for our entire family.
To be brave and courageous,
For I know the plans I have for you declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you Hope and Future
– Jeremiah 29:11
So once he’s sedated, Chris leaves him and meets up with me in the hallway. For some silly reason, Chris and I were fighting about something but I can’t remember what about. It must have been so stupid and silly. How can we be fighting at this particular time when both of us need to be comforted? We just handed our baby off to surgeons that are going to cut open his chest, break his ribs and fiddle with his heart! Yeah, a bit nerve racking! But I guess we just needed our time alone to gather our thoughts and realize how immature we are for being mean to one another at this time.
Anyhow, we managed to get it together and approximately 5hrs later we are back at Hospital waiting again. As we waited for approx 1hr, we see the surgeon Dr. Rebeyka come out and speak to us. He is a very confident surgeon and he informed us on what he had done, that he was very pleased with the work and everything looked really good and he should be extubated, brought to PICU and we should see him soon.
Well after 7hrs being in the OR, he finally makes his appearance at 8:00pm and looks good. They take him into PICU and we wait again for about 20min or so to go in to see him. Finally… We are able to see him and we are so happy on how he looks and how responsive he has been! Apparently, the first words that came out of his mouth when he woke up were “Don’t touch me, go away!” HA HA!! That sure sounds like something he would say.
I stayed with him all night and didn’t get any sleep at all, but when you’re running on adrenaline it’s hard to rest. I just wanted to make sure he was OK. He kept waking up every 5 to 10 minutes asking for water and apple juice and we were unable to give him anything until a minimum of 4hrs after the operation. But that didn’t stop him from asking, he was determined & persistent and once I was able to give him a bit of water on a sponge tip, he took it like a desperate person for liquids. It was the saddest/cutest/funniest thing I’ve ever seen. I kept sneaking some more for him through a sponge tip and eventually I told them he keeps asking for apple juice. They finally caved and allowed him 10ml at a time. Again, that was almost too cruel to do, he would just suck that juice from the sponge in desperation for more and would of course get really mad since we would say not right now, lets try later. That made him mad and at one point he said “Momma, I said I wanted Apple Juice!!” HA! HA!! It was only cute because he was still so sedated, yet he was still full of attitude.
I think he had a stretch of 30min sleep and that’s pretty much what I slept. The day after, I was feeling pretty zombie-like but so glad and thankful he was doing so good. I don’t think I was able to get any sleep until maybe his 2nd day.
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