Last night I was up until 11pm, I had a hard time sleeping. I kept re-reading all of the paperwork the Dr's office had given us (what to expect from anesthesia, r
outine for day surgery and recovery) In a way I'm thankful that I went to bed late, I had a good deep sleep. Our alarm got us up at 5:30am, we both weren't very talkative. We showered, got dressed and Colin had a bagel for breakfast. My tummy was doing somersaults so I opted for no breaky. We made sure our diaper bag was packed and then it was time to wake the little man (at 6:20), he was in a great mood! He didn't fuss at all while I changed his diaper (he's been going through some major teething and has been experiencing some bad rashes... nice timing, hey?!). We kept him in his sleeper while we put a jacket on him and grabbed Pooh before we whisked him out to the car and off we were. The entire car ride he was so happy! He was giving me kisses and cuddling with his Pooh.We got up to the third floor exactly at 7am and found the Day Surgery room, we turned the corner and walked in there with him and I think we both said "Oh boy". There were a row of hospital cribs (at least 6), all the cribs were so over sized (compared to ours) and white as Robbie's teeth; and at the foot of each crib was a blood pressure/heart rate monitor along with a pair of hospital PJ's. We slowly walked up to the desk while we were taki
ng in the thought that "the day" is actually here. We made our way up to the clerk and we gave her Robbie's name "oh, you're the first surgery of the day.... you're in bed number one" as she points behind us there's a crib with the number 1 above it. So we went over to our crib and Robbie wanted to hop right in there and play. I stood up in his crib as more babies/kids and their parents kept filing in and they were being directed to their bed. There was a little baby that was 2 cribs down from us that seemed to be exactly Robbie's age, they kept on talking and staring at each other (he's so fascinated with babies/kids right now). **side note: That Children's Hospital is amazing, each room we were in they had an enormous amount of toys and/or cartoons playing. It definitely made this experience a lot easier on us parents
So we had a nurse come by and she let us know, again, that we were the first patient of Dr. Wong's. She asked us to put Robbie into his hospital PJ's while she got all of her equipment ready to get some vitals. Off went Robbie's one piece sleeper and on went the traditional backless hospital gown and these adorable white and yellow stripped pants. The nurse tried to take his blood pressure (not sure if she was successful or not), got his heart rate, listened to his lungs and gave him a shot of Tylenol. We played with the hospital toys while we waited a little bit, then Ernie (another nurse) came in to get us. What a wonderful man... he absolutely loves his job and the kids, it's so evident. He asked us if Robbie would like a crib ride down to the surgery room or if he'd prefer it if we walked him down,
we opted to walk him down because we knew there'd be no way he'd sit still for the walk. Ernie was making all these birdy and daffy duck noises and Robbie just kept on smiling at him, he was in awe over that man (and so was I). So off we went on for our walk, we left the day surgery room and hung a right "to your right is the waiting room, once the nurses take him in you guys can wait here until you get buzzed. Dr Wong is very particular and likes the parents to be in the waiting room when he's done the surgery so that he can talk to them about how the procedure went" (which was music to our ears!) He turned at the following right and we went down this unmarked hallway, two doors opened automatically and Ernie parked Robbie's crib not to far from the doorway along the right side of the wall. We were in the "Holding Room", the surgery rooms were just down the hallway from where we were. We were the first ones in the holding room, at 7:30, so Robbie just went crazy; running around and smiling at all the nurses and doctors as they were starting their day. Ernie came in a couple more times with other babies, in total there were 4 of us in the holding area; surprisingly, there was only one other dad there. Nurses, doctors and anesthesiologists were coming to visit all the other families... but no one was coming to talk to us. We were starting to get a little discouraged, babies were getting wheeled out of the holding area and into their surgery room and not a single person that was assigned to us had come to talk to us (seeing as though we were the first in there & were suppose to be the first surgery of the day, we were getting a little antsy) Finally an oriental lady came up to us, dressed in green scrubs and a green hair cap..... oh my goodness, she was so hard to understand. She was talking to us about how she's going to put him to sleep and what she's going to do to him and I had to lean in and pretty much read her lips, she stumbled on English words which got me wondering how long she's been doing this in our country? (I'm not trying to sound rude/racist, but the Dr wants me to trust this lady to put needles in my baby's spine and she had to think about the translation and pronunciation for epidural?!... my mini vent, moving along) She explains to us that she's going to put a mask over his face to get him to go to sleep, once he's asleep they'll put in an IV and then she'll put an epidural (they call it "a block") in lower down on the s
pine than what I had for Robbie's birth. After the surgery she was going to put some freezing to the area as well. So off went the little oriental woman and then a really sweet nurse came up to us and introduced herself & asked if we had any questions. Colin asked if he could go into the room while Robbie gets put under, the nurse said that normal they don't recommend it. The baby is going to fuss and cry regardless because there's a mask being put over their face & having a parent there is just going to cause the parents more stress/sadness. I agreed with what she was saying and understood where they were coming from (flashback to when Robbie got circumcised... we thought it'd be the best thing to have family members in there, but in hindsight it was really detrimental to Colin) After the nurse left, Colin says "I want to go in with him".... oh boy. I vetoed that option, I don't want to have to nurse Robbie's physical wounds and Colin's mental wounds together @ the same time. I tried to remind him how he was with the circumcision ~~~to be continued (Robbie's awake)
It's now 4:02am and we just gave Robbie his meds w/ a bottle & of course now I can't sleep.... so on with my story!
cont... and agreed (hesitantly) that the nurses should take him into the surgery room. So as all the other babies slowly got wheeled away one by one, we were still waiting there. Our Dr still hadn't come to see us (grrrr!) we were the last crib in the "holding room" and you could see down the hallway there were about 5 nurses/dr's standing outside of a doorway talking about Dr. Wong & his tardiness. Finally at 8am he walks into the holding room and starts talking to us, "so I want you to tell me what we're doing to Robert today" he says "you're bringing down his left nut" I said s
arcastically while trying to lighten the mood, he proceeded to lift up his hospital top and mark an X with a permanent marker on the left side of his tummy. He went over the procedure again with us and asked us if we had any questions - nope, everything had been answered for us by the other Drs/nurses. The Dr gave us a Rx for codeine and said that he could have it for up to 2-3 days depending on how much pain he's in. Then one of the nurses took Robbie and held him as we said our last good-bye's to him... I had been dreading this moment for weeks. I gave him a bunch of kisses on his cheek and lips and then let his daddy have a turn at giving him some love, "we'll take good care of him" the nurse says... I wanted to say "you're cutting open my baby, how can that be taking GOOD care of him?" So daddy finished giving him some love and I grabbed his hand and we started walking out of the holding area "I want to go in with him" Colin says, I literally started crying. I appreciate and love the fact that he was trying to be strong for his little boy but it wouldn't be healthy for us to be in there. So I shook my head and said "no", he stopped us in the middle of the hallway and watched the nurse walk Robbie into the surgery room. Robbie was watching us as we watched him go into the room.... he was so content being with that nurse; then all the sudden she turned a corner and we couldn't see him any more. We both started crying. So we quickly tried to gather ourselves together and tried to set a plan in motion for when Robbie's done. We went down to the main level to get the Rx filled, it's liquid codeine (thank goodness!) and there wasn't much in the bottle, probably about 1/4 cup worth. Then we went over to the food court to get him some water & apple juice, I had brought a sippy cup w/ milk (no one told me that he'd be on a clear liquid diet) so I emptied and washed out the milk to fill it w/ 1/2 water and 1/2 apple juice. One of the nurses at the day surgery room had given us a buzzer (one of those vibrating/blinking things that the restaurant gives you when you're waiting for a table) and Colin was holding onto that for dear life. Once the juice was mixed he wanted to go upstairs and wait in the waiting room so that we didn't miss Dr. Wong. Up we went, back to the 3rd floor. The waiting room is connected to the surgery room so you could hear babies in there crying/laughing/talking and it was torture that we couldn't hear Robbie do the same. I tried to keep my mind off the fact that they were cutting my baby open right at that time, so I was
watching TV... Colin's eyes were permanently glossy, his leg was vibrating and he was fidgety with the buzzer. I tried to comfort him but nothing was going to make him feel better until he saw his baby. A couple of buzzers went off around us and the moms were racing out of the waiting area and into the day surgery room to go see their babies... that should have been us, if only the Dr wasn't over 30mins late! (grrr) So we waited and waited some more, it must have been close to 9am by the time Dr. Wong came to see us (which was a nice alternative to being buzzed) he took us into another room to discuss how it went. "Robert's doing fine. The testee is about 1/3 of the size of his other one. I was able to bring it all the way down, but it was hard... the vessels around the testee are trying to push it back up." I was trying to focus on all the information he was giving us, Tylenol every 4hrs for the entire day and night & codeine too (if need be) On Wednesday assess his pain and give it to him as needed. He warned us about constipation w/ codeine and that some babies get drowsy off of it & others get the complete opposite. He's to have sponge bath's up until Friday and on Saturday he's allowed to have a 5min soak in the tub. No bouncing on the knee, swings, rough play for 2-3weeks (we're telling everyone 3 weeks... just to be on the safe side). The Dr hopes the testee will grow now that it has the room, but he can't guarantee anything.... I asked if it would affect his hormones/fertility in any way & he shook his head and said no. The fertility rate is the same between having one or two testee's. So after we were bombarded with information and details he let us know that he's in a recovery room right now waking up, he'd be another 30mins (I just wanted to hold my baby, why can't I be there when he wakes up?!) so he told us that we could wait in the day surgery room or we could go back to the waiting room. We opted to go back to the day surgery room and wait for our baby. We gave the buzzer back to the lady at the front desk and we sat and waited in the same spot we started off. The little boy that was two cribs down was gone along with his parents, their diaper bag was the only thing sitting there. They must have been in the holding area. We watched as families were checking in and then others were being wheeled out in their crib by Ernie, he still made me smile even though I was so sad.Two nurses came by to introduce themselves and let us know that they'd be with us when Robbie gets brought back. They said that they were notified that he was being wheeled back into the day surgery room... we were so excited, finally! Colin saw him first, he was laying on his crib with his head raised all tucked in with a warm blanket. He was completely fine at first, he was smiling at the nurse that was pushing him into our "bay". As soon as he saw us the light switch got turned on and started crying... it literally broke my heart. He was wearing only a diaper and had a big towel wrapped around his left hand, underneath was his IV and something else that was glowing red (heart rate monitor?) The nurse said I could pick him up so I quickly scooped up my baby and gave him the biggest bear hug, he was soaking my shirt with all his tears and I couldn't help but have a mini breakdown of my own. I asked if Colin wanted to hold him and he opted not to, I think he just w
anted to look at him and watch him. So after that initial ball of emotion I sat down with Robbie on my lap and wrapped him up in the blanket, he immediately wanted Pooh (that stuffed animal has saved us in sooo many ways) I put Pooh our lap and hand my arm like a seat belt over Robbie with Pooh's head beside his. We swayed back and forth and he slowly calmed down. Colin asked the nurses when we could get the IV taken out and one of the nurses said that they wanted to see Robbie drink more fluids. He had drunken a little bit of apple juice in the recovery room, but now that he was with us all he wanted was love and that was fine by me! He went through waves where he'd cry uncontrollably for a couple of minutes and then would calm himself down and then would repeat it over and over, one of the nurses asked if we thought some TV would help. We both thought it would be a great way to get his mind off of the pain, she wheeled over a TV and DVD and offered us Blues Clues or Barney.... he loves both, but we haven't seen Barney in a while so we opted for that one. As she was putting the DVD in we kept on trying to offer the juice to him, every time we offered it he would start to cry uncontrollably. The nurse suggested a Popsicle, seeing as though he's never had one we thought he'd really like it (especially seeing as though he's teething) He didn't wanted it when we originally offered it but suggested that Colin rub it over his lips... that did the trick! He was quite happy sucking on it, it smelled like it was flavoured pineapple(?) Daddy finally took a turn holding his boy~~~to be continued. it's now 5am, I'm going to bed for now.
We had to keep Robbie in the hospital with us for an hour to make sure he wasn't nauseated (didn't vomit at all, just a couple of Popsicle burps!) and to make sure he still had an appetite. When the nurses saw him going to town on the Popsicle they took out his IV... oh my goodness, how much tape can you put on such a little area?! I had Robbie pinned down with a bear hug as the nurses took off the ridiculous amount of tape over his hands, fingers and arm (the IV was on the inside of his wrist, right bellow his thumb) Of course he didn't like the tape that was being ripped off of him... owie! After he was rid of the IV he was 100% better, the hospital had a wooden butterfly that was hanging from the ceiling and if you pulled on a cord it would flap it's wings, Robbie was in awe over it and kept on trying to reach up to it. Ernie came by to see how he was doing and Robbie gave him some big smiles as he made all these cool animal noises. We finally got the OK to come home! They did a last check on his vitals and then we put him in his PJ's and off we went.
We got home and Robbie was in a great mood and his appetite was back in full force. He had a banana, nectarine, toast w/ peanut butter and some chicken off of my pizza that day. He wasn't a big fan of the water/apple juice combo but definitely wanted some cold water to wash everything down. He was still numb in his waist & hips from "the block" aka epidural and his voice was a little scratchy from having a breathing tube but he was quite happy playing on the floor for a little bit.... then he tried to pull himself up with the help of the toy box, I held onto his hips but he obviously didn't like the feeling he had because he started to cry. We quickly distracted him with his toys and he was happy on our laps for a little bit longer. He kept on trying to stand up and was pretty stubborn about doing it, I held onto his hands and helped him stand up and he'd take one step and his legs would buckle underneath him (reminds me of when I had an epidural when I was in labour w/ Robbie, the nurse asked if I thought I could walk to the washroom. My legs felt fine but as soon as I put some weight on them they gave out & I had no control.... thankfully Colin was holding onto me & caught my fall) He was starting to get frustrated, it was around 12:30 when Colin suggested maybe he have a nap. We got a bottle ready for him (the nurses suggested skim milk so that it's easier on his stomach) and off we went to put him to bed, he drank the whole bottle and ended up sleeping for almost 3 hours. What a great baby!
We kept on top of the medication last night, the Dr told us that you're either ahead of the pain or you're always playing catch up with it. So we were quite strict about the tylenol, I was hesitant about the codiene... he hadn't pooped all day (condiene causes constipation) so we agreed to give him 1/2 of his 7:30pm dosage and then a full one for the following. Thankfully, he did poop around 8! He was walking again by about 4-5pm. He did fuss when he fell down on his bum and you can tell that his left side is bothering him, he's quick to prop his right side up but needs help with his left side.
He is our hero, in every sense of that word. Maybe it's the drugs, but he's had a smile on his face and has been giving us so much love. Colin was so worried that he'd hate us but it's the complete opposite, this procedure as hard as it's been... has definitely broughten us closer to our son. Just a couple days ago I was up all night with Robbie and I was so mad at myself because I couldn't comfort him, he didn't want to rest his head on my shoulder... he didn't even want to be held by me. I was so upset with myself being a mom that I couldn't even comfort my own child by holding and loving him. Yesterday made me feel really good, I could walk around with him and he'd lay his head on my shoulder and soak in all my love; if he was fussy I could rock him and make him feel better.
Last night our alarm didn't go off when we were to give him a full dose of tylenol and codiene, so I woke up around 2:45 in a panic. I tried to just give him Tylenol and put him back to bed, he fussed on and off for a good hour (while I was writting the second portion of this update) So around 4 we gave him a bottle & codiene and he was out like a light (he had only drank 2oz before bed... he was that tired). It's now 9:49 and he's still sleeping, so I'm just going to follow his lead today. I'm only going to give Tylenol if needed and the codiene will only be used if necessary.
Thanks to everyone for their well wishes, thoughts, prayers, etc. They mean a lot.
PS. All pictures are from Thanksgiving w/ Grammie & Grampie
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