Surgery Update and Prayer Request

What a long day it's been!!! I am overwhelmed, though, with gratitude - to our heavenly Father for His grace and peace throughout this ordeal, and to our amazing friends and family for their support and prayers which I know are making a HUGE difference!

They took Mackenzie back a little before 9:00 a.m. for surgery. The doc had said it would be around 11:30/12:00 p.m. when they would finish. 11:30 passed. 12:00 passed. 12:30 passed. 1:00 passed. I was starting to get really worried. That's when your mind starts going to the dark places...when your ears start listening for, "Code blue, Operating Room..."

I got a LOT of knitting done.

They came and got me and took me to the recovery room. They always assume, with babies, that mom will go first. I think Darrell's feelings were hurt. What about the dad? They only allow one person at a time at the bedside in recovery, so we had to take turns. Of course, it all depends on the nurse - last time, our nurse let both of us be in there.

I got in there, and our poor baby was crying and upset - take one look at the picture, and you can see why! They put a stitch through the tip of her tongue, and it's taped to the outside of her cheek. OUCH!! It's there because there's a big problem with the tongue swelling after this surgery, which can cause airway obstruction, and if they need to get the tongue out of the way in a hurry, they need to be able to do so - thus the stitch to pull the tongue out of the way. Still...ouch!

Surgery was more complicated than the doc anticipated. He was visibly exhausted when he came to talk to us. He said when he first got in there, her adenoids were inflamed and when he touched them, they started to bleed. He stopped everything and called for an Ear, Nose, & Throat doc to come up and take a look at them. That doc said they were okay and didn't need to be removed. Dr. Kiran said, though, that throughout the surgery, she continued to bleed, far more than usual. He asked why her hemoglobin was so low last time it was checked (in October it was 9 point something). We don't know - but she's on iron because of it. He said he would run an H & H and if her hemoglobin was below 7, he'd do a transfusion. It came back at 8.8 and 25, so he didn't transfuse her. He also said that he had a really hard time with her palate, which he didn't anticipate. The openings didn't look that wide, but her mouth is tiny, and no matter how he tried, he just couldn't get things to come together...so he ended up having to use cadaver tissue to close it up. He said in all the palates he's repaired, only one other time has he had to use it!

Not really surprised Mackenzie has to be different. It's the way our family does things.

Once they moved her to the Pediatrics unit, she started to have some mild stridor (breathing issues) and her oxygen sats were in the mid-90's, so the doc ordered continuous cool mist oxygen blow-by. She is swelling - her face (even her eyelids), her hands, her forearms...so they gave her a dose of steroids. She is running a fever, and she's already on antibiotics. She got a does of morphine, and a few minutes later had a major episode of agitation - which seems to confirm my suspicion from last time that she's having a reaction to the morphine - so they gave her some Ativan, and she calmed down. Her heart rate is too high - 190-220 - and they don't know if it's because she's in pain, or because she's anemic, or because she's got an infection and running a fever. The pediatrician is going to have a hematologist (blood specialist) see her tomorrow to further assess why she's anemic and why she was bleeding so much. She's actually still bleeding, from her nose and some from her mouth.

Darrell is spending the night with her tonight. Makayla was so happy when I got home, if she could've run to me, she would have. I didn't take a pump with me today, so I was pretty happy to see her too!! :)

When I talked to Darrell a little while ago, he said Mackenzie had woken up and gotten agitated again, and they had given her some more medicine, and she was now resting on his chest. Hopefully both she and he will be able to get some rest tonight!!

Speaking of rest...I'm off to get some myself! Thanks for your continued prayers and support. The hospital doesn't have internet, but I'll try to keep updating Twitter via my cell phone. My tweets show up both on this blog (in the sidebar) and on my Facebook page.