Wow, what a day. Draining for sure. It started out OK, with some general pre-op stuff. He was great for the initial height/weight/temp, etc. As soon as they mentioned bloodwork, he was done! They put some "magic cream" on his arm to numb it, then had us do the rest of the appts. while it kicked in. The tears were flowing, so we opened one of his gifts (thanks, Curt!) and that helped distract him for awhile. He kept crying and pitching a fit through photos, but was great while meeting with the craniofacial and neurosurgery coordinators and anthropologist. The child life specialist was awesome with him and walked him through some role-playing with a doll getting bloodwork. His turn was next, and the kicking and screaming started again. The "magic cream" did its job, and I don't think he was in any pain, but the fear had him very upset. We had half an hour to kill before we met with the craniofacial surgeon, so we got some ice cream and all was forgiven!
The surgeon appt was very informative. He does think the best course is the reconstruction vs. just the bone graft. The issue is in the way the original surgeon did the first two surgeries...there is no "good" bone left up front to reconstruct the brow the way he would like. So, what he'll have to day is swap the bone from the front to the back of the skull in order to get the best angle up front. He still expects it'll take about 5 hours on Friday and that we'll spend one night in PICU, one night on the regular floor, then back to the hotel Sunday. He expects his eyes will still be swollen shut at that point, but says they sleep and recover better outside of the hospital. (And he told Zack that the good thing about his eyes being swollen shut is that we'll give him whatever he wants!)
We finally left the hospital to get some lunch at the "Purple Cow." (a reco from our child-life specialist, Amy!) Then we were off to Adventure Landing for a little break. Zack and Dave played a little Laser Tag, then Zack went to drive the Go-Karts. He had an absolute blast! When he was done, he kept saying that he was the luckiest kid in the world! (Which of course made me happy and broke my heart all at the same time!) He crashed within 10 minutes of getting back to the hotel. I think I'll join him for a bit.
4 comments:
Sweet Zack that made me tear up when I read that he said he was the luckiest kid in the world. Praying for you guys!
You and me, both, Em! It was such a Zack thing to say, but a couple hours after hearing they were going to have off the front AND back of his skull, it was a little more than I could take. The beauty of having him with us at all times is that we have to put on our happy faces and roll with the punches a bit. :-)
Tell Zack that JJ is jealous that he got to drive a Jeff Gordon car.
Love You Guys and take care.
Yay for Zack to see the highlights of the day being the go karts and not the surgery! Praying for you guys!
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