L-O-N-G day

Ok, if this post is a little crazy it is because I went to bed at 1am, woke up at 4am and just got home from the hospital a short time ago. I am so tired I am starting to lose it. Anyway Naomi had her surgery today. It was long. Some things happened that were not expected, not major but not expected. So here it goes.

4:00am I wake up and get Naomi ready to go. I packed her bag, bathed her and did her hair the night before so she would get optimal sleep.

4:25am Naomi and I leave to go the Children's Hospital which is like 40 minutes from us.

5:20am We arrive at CH. We are early(had to be there at six). Naomi is very cheery.

6:10am My mom meets us and they check us in

6:45am We are lead back to the surgical prep area. They weight Naomi, who has gained 7 pounds since coming home(yeah!)and check her temp. They give her pjs to put on and check her BP. They ask me a ton of questions. Fun stuff.

7:10am The doctor comes in and explains the whole surgery and all the possible risks. There are quite a few, but are few and far between.

7:35am Naomi and I go back to the operating room after I don scrubs a mask and an ugly blue hair net. I hoist Naomi on the table and she lays down. They then ask her to breath in a mask that they have put some lovely strawberry smelly stuff on. She says ok at first but then freaks and struggles. She falls asleep in about 20 seconds. I leave and go to the surgical waiting room with mom.

9:30am they call me and let me know they have finished putting all of the IV's in and gave her a central line and epidural. She also is intubated. They say everything is good and surgery is about to begin.

11:30am Another call, things are going well!

1:15pm call...things are still progressing, breath sounds and BP stable. All looks good.

3:30pm Things are going as planned, still working. Naomi is stable and fine

5:00pm Call....things are running longer than planned. Naomi is stable. No details. Doctor will either be out to talk to us when he is done, or we will get another call in 2 hours, eek.

7:05pm Doctor comes out to talk to us. He says Naomi is stable. He says he is sure we are wondering why the surgery was not the 6-8 hours as planned, but 12? Yes we are wondering, but glad she is stable. Doc tells us that what he wanted to do was a regular disection of Naomi's remaining esophogus, when he went in through a large scar from a previous surgery she had in Liberia, he was not happy with what he found. While the esophogus looked ok on the scope and xray, is was hard like cement. It had also actually fused itself to her other organs in that area, top of the stomach and her trach. He decided a regular disection was a no go. So they had to make a seperate incision closer to where the esophogus sits. They made one in her upper right chest and then used a rib spreader(makes me tear up thing about that) to move her ribs apart and get to the area. They then gently removed the esophogus little by little. They then made the gastric tube with a piece of stomach. They opened the neck to attach it to where the esophogus had been. They then noticed bubbles. This meant her trach had been torn during the removal of bad scar tissue. She was losing oxygen and blood. They repaired they tear and connected the gastric tube. They then gave her one bag of blood due to blood loss. After this they put a drain in one side of her neck and two drains in the chest cavity. Then they closed her up. He says they will keep her in a coma like state for a few days in the PICU to ward off infection, shock and pain. Then they will slowly bring her out of it. She will then be moved to the Peds surgical floor. Doc says he will see us soon and leaves.

7:30pm Nurse gets us and tells us to wait by elevators and we will see Naomi in about 20 minutes. They wheel her out of the OR quicker then that. She looks really good, the tubes and wires though are scary and sad. Her neck is MAJORLY swollen. Makes me want to cry. They wisk her up the elevator to the PICU and tell us they have to get her settled and on the vent. We can go up to the PICU waiting room and they will call us in a few hours.

Naomi is stable and looks good. The vent is not so pretty and a tad scary for me. I pray she has no pain and that she sleeps soundly. I am now home with kids 1,3 and 4. They are sleeping and I am not because I needed to update you. Long day, nerve racking day. I pray my baby gets through this and that her pain is minimal. I wish I could take it all, for Naomi and all my children. It hurts being a mom sometimes. You can feel so helpless at times. These are the times to lean on the Lord and remember he has me, you and our babies in the palm of his all mighty hand. This is a GOOD place to be! This is where my baby girl is!

Anyway will write more tomorrow. So tired..want my bed.

Love ya all,

Jen