WARNING: We wish to advise you that the following post has been written on less than three hours of sleep, is not in chronological order, is long and rambling and contains an F-bomb (or two).
It's OVER! Spring has most definitely sprung now that Tricky's
Go Go Gadget springs are gone!
This morning he went in to theatre as a Bionic Baby and emerged with help of the Blue Fairy (his surgeon in blue scrubs) as a Real Boy. Eat your heart out, Pinnochio!
The day had some ups and downs, and because it's good to end on a high, let's go down first:
Tricky spent almost an hour in the post surgical recovery area where you are monitored until you are sufficiently out of anaesthesia and your vital signs are good. He just refused to wake up.
My poor little poppet would open his eyes for less than a second then promptly fall fast asleep. His oxygen levels kept dipping below 85% and at one point got to 79% - that's not life threatening stuff, but it needs to be monitored and he had to be on oxygen for the first hour to keep it up before being moved to a ward.
In the hand over from surgical nurse to ward nurse (who I'll call Nurse Dimwit) his low oxygen levels were mentioned and it was stressed they needed to be monitored and that he had to be on oxygen if they fell below 92%. So off we went with Nurse Dimwit to the ward where a new pulseox machine was set up because the one already attached to him in surgery (and bound to him with his IV) had a different cord to the machines on the ward - clever huh? As if there weren't enough bloody cords and drips hanging off him already.
He still hadn't woken up, was a little bit gray and breathing quite shallow, but hey, he was attached to a machine so we didn't think anything of it... you can see where this is going can't you? An hour later a different nurse walked past our machine, does an exaggerated double take like you'd expect in a cartoon, then calls out to Nurse Dimwit "Did you set the alarm parameters on this?"
Tricky's oxygen levels had been under 85% for a whole fucking hour because Nurse Dimwit didn't turn the alarm on. No wonder he was fucking grey!
I was livid. I couldn't talk. I just sat there as big, fat, silent tears rolled down my cheeks - like the ones in the movies, except my nose was red and my eyes were puffy.
I did the fuggo version of the silent movie star cry a few times; when the four year old in the bed next to us was crying out in big, heaving sobs "I...want....my....Da-... -ad" and when the tweenage girl a few beds down laid there by herself for an hour and a half while her parents waited in the 'Friendship Room' still thinking their daughter was in surgery thanks to a monumental communication fuc... no, two is enough.
But it wasn't all doom and gloom... I did, after all, promise to end on an Up:
Going in, the anaethetist prepared me for the worst case scenario of a child going under. There was a possibility Tricky would cry, fight against it, shake as if having a fit, make snorty noises (like his Mama), roll his eyes back in his head, then go limp. The limp bit was the bit I
feared most.
They were so gentle and kind with him, bringing the strawberry scented gas mask to the side of his face and trying to get him to play with it, rather than just shoving it on. He wasn't interested so they did have to shove it on, but that's not the point. They tried to make it as gentle as possible.
He fought it a little bit and cried out, trying to pull it from his face... but then he started to go a little weak and at that first sign, they said "Now Mum, give him a kiss and we'll see you soon". They weren't rude or abrupt, but they were very commanding, knowing that he was about to go completely under. As I kissed his cheek, his whole body relaxed in to the bed and I turned and left so quickly that I fumbled with the door.
I even made it all the way back to the 'Friendship Room' before crying.
A short while after all the oxygen issues were sorted (I told you it wasn't in chronological order, it's instead in bad news/good news order), it was like someone flipped Tricky's on switch. He went from hard to rouse to hard to keep still within a matter of minutes. All he wanted to do was climb up on the bed rails, pull on his TWO pulseox cords and bang on the oxygen machine. He was so difficult to contain... it was lovely.
He then slid right back in to his routine that we've been trying so hard to maintain. His new found (and hard fought for) talent of sleeping through the night is the only thing that is keeping me sane. He simply replaced his morning nap with morning anaesthesia and didn't miss a beat. I realize he hasn't had a chance to sleep through, seeing as the surgery was today, but it's a start and I believe in starts!
So it was a stressful day but exciting at the same time. After a checkup in one week (that is scheduled for 8:31am I might add) and six weeks, he should only need to be monitored once every year or two - according to the surgeon we just have to wait and watch him grow. I'm looking forward to it.
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Thank you so much to all the wonderful people who left a comment on my previous post sharing their personal stories, wishing us well, thinking of and praying for Tricky. It was so lovely to feel such support from people I am yet to meet. Thank you.
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