Home from the Hospital

Well, we are home from surgery after a really long and painful night for all involved. Things started off better than we expected. Norah woke up Thursday morning at 5:55, a good hour earlier than she usually wakes up and right under the pedialyte cut off of 6:10 am. I had no faith that she was going to drink a pedialyte bottle but she did take down about 3 ozs and then was very patient until shortly after we arrived at the hospital.

Here we are in the waiting room. Then we went to an exam room and they took her temp (only slightly elevated) and we waited for the doctors. Norah knows all about the doctors office and what happens there.

She was very on to us. Then the doctors came in to discuss the surgery and somehow there was a mistake and they did not have the ear tubes listed on the paperwork. I don't know what the deal was there because I had told about 10 people about it by that point but they said there was no ENT on staff and they would have to schedule a SEPARATE procedure at another time. I was PISSSSSSED. My baby cannot go through any more. Below she mirrors my feelings about that news.

We kept her calm in the exam room for a good hour and a half and she was doing okay until the anesthesiologist came to take her away. The last thing we saw was her screaming and reaching for me. Bad bad times.

Then when she was in surgery (for an ETERNITY) cousins Aiden and Liam and Aunt Jess stopped by to check on us. It was a welcome distraction that helped pass the time.

The boys were all smiles... love my boys!

WARNING GRAPHIC PICS BELOW.

Then they came and got us both to go to recovery. My poor baby

She was a very unhappy girl after it was over and who can blame her. They did not give her morphine like they told us she would get, they did Tylenol with codeine instead. I really think at many points yesterday and through the night she needed something stronger. She was conscious throughout almost all of yesterday where we had assumed she would be in a drugged up stupor to keep her calm and still. Not the case. She was bleeding quite a bit and putting her hands in her mouth and pulling on her stitches. We were told that she would do it once and realize it hurts and then would not do it again. Not our girl. She only wanted to mess with her face. Also, they did not want her to lay on her stomach so I had to stay up all night and keep flipping her over (she is a tummy sleeper). At one point I lost it and the nurse had to tell me to go get some fresh air. It was so so hard watching her cry and knowing how much she hurt but not being able to do anything to help her. She was tied to several machines monitoring vitals & IVs and holding her was hard when she was awake and squirming around. At one point before bed she was unplugged from the IV but they left the input in and her arm splinted so she was beating me with it and smacking herself in the face whenever she tried to rub her eyes or suck her thumb. She could not get comfortable. I could not get comfortable either, this was right up there with the trip home from Viet Nam. A hot room, babies screaming, nurses (stewardesses, turbulence) waking her every 30 minutes, Barnabas snoring, a very very uncomfortable chair, sweatshirt wrapped around my head and like 1 hour of sleep. The only problem was we did not arrive in an exciting city with a happy baby. No rewards yet.

Oh and the scar on the back of her head was removed and she has A LOT of stitches back there so laying on her back is not much fun either. It looks like she was hit in the head with a bat to be honest.

Then this morning we had 12 more people come in to examine her for discharge. Again not a happy baby and again we were told she would not do things that hurt her and she could not mess up the surgery so we will see. In the car on the way home she was shoving her plastic keys in her mouth. We have to leave the steri-strip on for 6 days and cannot wash her face during that time. That means she cannot eat food only bottles. Also because of the back of her head she cannot have her hair washed for a week. She has to leave the nose tubes in for 3 weeks and then they will remove the stiches holding them in place. That is going to seem like an eternity for her as they are really annoying and clog with blood and snot. All we can do is lightly dab and she hates it. So, wish us luck, we have some hard times ahead in the next few days. I hope she starts feeling better soon. She just looks miserable.

LET ME GO HOME!!!