The Surgery

Heading to the hospital

We did it. We've survived the week of The Surgery. As we watched her run around the yard yesterday with her siblings (as one does five days after major surgery), we felt like we may be coming out on the other end of the experience.

Her surgery has been planned since she was born. She had an ACE procedure, which puts a "button" in her belly at the top of her colon that we use each day to flush her bowels out. (Mike is jealous and wants a button too - ha!) She has a "mickey" button right now, and in a few months, we'll trade that out for a Chait tube, which will be flatter and smaller.

Surgery was scheduled for Wednesday, but we had to go in on Tuesday for bowel prep. Mike was going to take her in that day and I was going to meet them up there after work. To avoid the undesirable two cars in the parking ramp scenario, I planned to drop them off on Tuesday, get them settled, and head to work. No one truly anticipated the horribleness of Tuesday. Long story slightly shorter, I worked from the hospital that day.

The Tube 

Fiona had an NG tube placed through her nose to her stomach and then had a strong solution run through it for 14 hours to clean her colon out. She hated the tube. We didn't blame her. And she was pretty stuck in her bed for the day, hooked up to the solution. We watched movies, listened to music, and played with her new iPad. Only two things made her smile that day - a visit from the pet guinea pigs that she got to pet and feed and a visit from one of the teachers at school. It was a really hard day on her. By late afternoon, she simply gave up talking because it was too uncomfortable (the silence was eerie!). So she communicated with me through a series of thumbs up and down, pats, and points.

Tube is OUT!

She was supposed to get her tube out at 2am; by midnight, she was over it! We tried to go back to sleep for a while, but eventually, I ended up in the bed next to her so we could watch Jimmy Fallon and the Roots clips on my phone. Nurse Claire must have heard us moving around in there, because she came in at 2am on the dot to remove that tube! The side effect was that poor Fiona threw up a couple times after the tube came out ... probably because of all the stuff they pumped into her. By the time daddy arrived on Wednesday morning, we were in the playroom, celebrating being tube free!

As we waited in her room for surgery to call us down, one of the volunteer dogs visited her room. Izzy was bigger than Yogi and happily climbed right up on her bed for a few pets and scratches. She's such an animal person that the pet visits just made her day! Once we headed down to the surgery center, we passed the time making a princess crown that she wore during her surgery. The actual surgery went very well. We passed the time by getting some food (since she was starving, so were we. It felt wrong to eat in front of her!) and about 90 minutes later, they called me back to the recovery area. She still won't tell me if she wanted me ... or just knew I had her Clifford.

On her way to surgery

Thanks to Auntie picking up the littles, both Mike and I were able to stay up with Fiona while she got settled. When I left at bedtime to go home, she had officially reached hangry (two days of not eating will do that to a girl). When I got back in the morning, she was still upset because no one had furnished food yet! Shortly after I arrived, Dr. Marker came in and said "let's eat." They are pretty much best friends now!

Thursday was recovery day. She was pretty sore in the morning, but we were slowly able to convince her to start moving around. The "eat and drink" part of her checklist to go home was no problem! A visit from Grandpa V and our friend Colleen lifted her spirits a bit. After lunch, I helped her get dressed in real clothes and sweetened the "move around" deal. If she would walk down to the playroom on her own, we would paint. Paint will always inspire our little artist!!

Surgery crown

Later that day, we got a short visit from her little sibs (we had to meet them in the lobby) and then her friend Makai from school came up. Since Makai is five, he came up to the playroom with us. Those two had SO MUCH FUN. They played around for almost two hours. She moved slow and steady, but having a buddy there was so motivating for her and helped her forget about all the yucky stuff. When she got tired, we headed to her room so she and Makai could play iPad for a bit. Once Makai left, she, Auntie, and I ate dinner together and watched ice skating. Other than the IV that was still in her arm - and a source of great distress to her - she was doing great.

Our night nurse on Thursday was nice, but not my favorite. She didn't try very hard to not wake Fiona up during the night. We were both a little tired on Friday morning! As we waited for daddy to come up, Dr. Glasser came in. He told me that her numbers looked great and that she was doing really well. I asked if he thought we could go home. He said that Dr. Marker is usually pretty conservative and would want to keep her one more day. I said that we would really love to go and Dr. Glasser went back out to his computer. He came back a couple minutes later and told me to go ahead and push when Dr. Marker wanted to keep her.

Out of surgery

Fiona and I headed down to the playroom to check out the Little People situation. Dad and Grandpa found us there. And then Dr. Marker found us there. As Dr. Glasser predicted, he said she was doing great but "it wouldn't hurt to keep her one more day." I pushed a little and we got the all clear to leave once she got one more round of meds and we learned how to work her new button. Luckily, her friends Ellie and Oliver were on their way - which would help bridge the time to the last batch of meds. We met them in the playroom and had a great time. It was wonderful to see her distracted by her friends and having fun.

I headed to pick up the littles after we got home on Friday afternoon. I told them that we had a surprise for them at home. Declan immediately guessed "football game." When I told him "no," he guessed "football." When he got a "no" on that, he guessed "basketball game." At that point, I told him he couldn't play anymore! Quinn asked many strategic questions. About halfway home, she said, "Mama, I think it's a person" and had the biggest grin on her face. It was a person (her favorite person!) and she did not stop grinning for the rest of the night! We were so happy to be back together and the kids were thrilled to be a trio again.

We are so grateful for all the words of encouragement and support during the week. Our phones and social media accounts were blowing up - in the best way possible. Thank you all for the love that you wrapped our family in during these days. It was appreciated more than we can say!

FINALLY - FOOD!

Painting in the playroom after surgery

iPad with Makai

Thank you note to her nurses before we left

SO HAPPY to be home!