Survived Surgery

Ahhhhh, home and able to sleep in my own bed.  Jonah had surgery on Wednesday to repair a diaphragmatic hernia, I know, I had never heard of it either.  It was congenital and his liver grew itself into the hernia.

Anyways he was supposed to have this done last fall, but got sick the day before so we postponed it until spring.  I had been dreading it very much.  I didn’t tell tons of people about it in case it got cancelled.  Well I was able to keep him well (even with Brandon getting strep throat the day before) and the surgery went as planned.  I actually felt very calm about it and didn’t get worried. 

The hardest part about surgery and kids is making sure they don’t eat anything.  Poor Jonah cried on the way to the hospital, Ba Ba, Ba Ba.  While in the waiting room he licked the bubbles off the bubble stick, he was really hungry.  The surgery lasted about 2 1/2 hours and went perfectly.  The surgeon came to talk to us afterwards and said it had gone exactly as planned.  Yea, the worst was over.

Well really the worst part is trying to sleep in a hospital for two nights.  The first night Jonah wouldn’t stay in the crib they had him in so they switched him to a regular hospital bed which was fine except for the fact that I had to stay with him in the bed to make sure he didn’t climb out.  I think I got a total of 3 hours that night.  I was so happy when the resident came in at 6:00 a.m. Yea the night was over and I could get up and quit pretending to sleep.  The second night was much better.  Jonah discovered the wagons they have at the hospital and after several rides on the “beep beep” he wouldn’t get out and so he fell asleep in it.  That lasted until the 12:30 a.m. vitals check, he then couldn’t get back to sleep for 2 hours.  I did finally get him back to sleep in the hospital bed.  I knew he would be just fine so I went back to sleep on the couch until 6:30.

Wednesday and Thursday he was on morphine and slept most of the time.  He would wake up long enough to cry and ask for a Ba Ba, which he finally was able to have Thursday evening.  By Thursday night he felt much better, mainly because they switched to motrin.  Friday he was climbing up the bed and sliding down.  We spent the entire day walking the halls of the hospital waiting for the Dr. to have time to come and discharge us.  Finally at 5:00 p.m. we were out of there.

As I was driving home I was thinking about how blessed we were that the surgery went off without a hitch.  There were some complications that could have happened during surgery, but they didn’t.  He could have had a reaction to the morphine, but he didn’t.  He could have had trouble breathing, but he didn’t.  He could have had trouble with eating, but he didn’t.  The biggest event was when Bryan was holding him and I noticed blood all over Jonah’s blanket.  His IV had come out of his foot and there was blood everywhere, all over Bryan, the floor, the bed.  Luckily he had consumed enough fluids that day and they didn’t have to put it back in.

I am so grateful the surgery and recovery is over.  Any adult would still be tenderly walking and moving, but not a baby.  He was climbing everywhere as soon as the surgery was done!