The Surgery

It's now been 4 months since James's surgery. I really wanted to document some of the surgery details-before I forget everything about it. I don't have enough good things to say about Primary Children's Hopital and all the Dr's we had there. We were so extremely blessed to be able to do this there. 

The surgery lasted about 5 hours and the nurses kept giving us updates along the way, which we really appreciated. It was a long wait, and we tried to keep ourselves distracted as much as possible so we didn't go crazy or break down in the waiting room. It seemed so strange to see so many parents come and go while we were still waiting. We longed for the time it was our turn to see the Dr. and have him report that surgery went well. Luckily that time finally came. We were so anxious to see our little guy and let him know we were here for him. When we went to see him in the ICU, we were pleasantly surprised by the wrap the surgeons put on his head. It was a cute alien wrap. It made him look so adorable. James looked so sweet and peaceful, yet swollen. He was asleep still. I did not want to leave his side because I was afraid he would wake up when I was gone and be so scared not knowing where in the world he was. But he didn't really wake up for 2 days. He would kind of wake up whimpering in pain, then the nurses would give him morphine, and back to sleep he would go. It was amazing to see how quickly he started recovering though. It didn't take more than a day or two to be completely off morphine and by the end of our 5 day stay in the hospital, he was basically just on Tylenol and Advil. 

Through this whole thing, I was amazed with how tough James was. He is just the sweetest yet toughest little guy. We were so touched by the outpouring of love by so many. He has healed really well, and he definitely looks like a different boy-that was probably the hardest part for me. I mean, he looks great and handsome, he just looked different. It didn't take long to know that this was still the same sweet boy. Now we get a lot of comments from people telling us he looks more like Charlie's brother. Pictures say it all better than I do. So we'll let the pics do the rest.

Getting all dressed for surgery prep. Giving him away to the Dr's was one of the hardest things. SO hard to watch him walk away not knowing what was about to happen to him.

 When we finally got to see him, this is how he looked. Sweet and puffy little alien

The first time I got to hold him about 24 hours after surgery. Kind of scary with all his plugs and cords, I was worried I would pull on one and hurt him, but it was so nice to have him in my arms again.

He's awake! Head wrap off for about a day (by the time we took this photo)-it came off 5 minutes before Charlie was coming to visit. We had no time to prep him, or us. It was a little scary looking right when they took it off with the stitches and huge tube in his forehead used for a drain. By the time of this photo, he looked much better. We hated that tube in his head, it was uncomfortable for him. Once that came out, he was even more himself.

He's finally sitting up

Such a sweet, happy little guy-swollen and all. I was so glad his eyes never completely swelled shut.

We got to "unplug" James on day 3 (or 4?) and take him for a walk around the hospital. He was in heaven walking by lots of people, and just having a change of scenery.

2 weeks post op. It's amazing how fast the human body can heal. This side looked great, the other side was a little infected, but still. I was amazed. 

Here he is now, hair coming in and all. Looking good. We feel so blessed that everything went so well. Thank you to everyone for your prayers and support!