Thursday (July 19th) morning was a whirlwind of activity. I had thankfully gotten a descent night sleep and was trying to get my room packed up and ready for our next transition. I was trying to keep my mind occupied, but to be honest, I was scared out of my whits. I didn't really know what was to come and could feel that my world was about to change.
A team came to get me at about 11:00am. With a tearful departure from my sister Ali and my mom, I was wheeled down to pre-op. There I was talked to by about 5 different doctors and their teams and also got two IVs started. After what seemed like an eternity (about 3 hours in real time), I was wheeled into the OR, while Carl had to wait in the lobby. There I was given a spinal block . . . which didn't work quite well enough, so after a few minutes, I was given another one. When I was good and numb from the chest down, the Urologist started placing my stints and placed a camera into my bladder so she could see exactly where my placenta had attached itself. From there, the Internal Radiologist team took over and placed catheters into my femoral arteries to help stop the bleeding during my hysterectomy. All of this took about two hours. While they worked on me, I tried to close my eyes and just go to a different place. Let me tell you, it is not easy being awake during surgery. It is a complete mind game. When you have a entire room full of doctors and nurses (about 15-20 people in my OR) working on you, talking about the procedure, yelling out things that you have no idea what they are talking about . . . it's quite intense. Thank God for the wonderful nurses who kept talking to me and ensuring me that everything was going well.
Once everything was in place, they brought Carl in and started with the delivery.
At 4:07pm I saw a sweet little face peek over the curtain for a second before he was rushed into the OR next door. I was happy to hear him squawk a little before he left the room. Within a minute, I was given happy gas and was off under general anesthesia for the rest of my surgery.
As most of you already know, I had a hysterectomy and also had my bladder repaired. The surgery took about 5 1/2 hours. My doctors assured me that there were no surprises during surgery. I was wheeled into recovery where I stayed until after midnight. During surgery, I was given 4 blood transfusions, and in recovery and in my room that night, I was given 4 more, and also some other blood products through my IVs. I don't remember much of anything during this time period. Apparently in recovery, I was being "quite a character" with the nurses . . . hum . . . that could mean many different things :)
The next day was also a blur. I was still heavily medicated and was in and out all day and night. Since I was in rough shape, I was not allowed to see Carter until later that evening. They took me (and my whole family) over to Children's Hospital on a bed, because I was still unable to sit up at all. This was also the first time I saw my girls. It was really hard, because I was trying to put on this act that I was just fine, but they knew better (especially Jocie) . . . I just couldn't keep my eyes open . . . even during conversations. I do, however, remember when I first got to hold Carter. The nurse just laid him down on my neck and chest, and we both immediately relaxed. He stopped crying, and I stopped hurting. It was wonderful.
Carter was doing pretty well. They were expecting him to do better than he was doing because he was 34 weeks, had steroid shots, and was big for his gestation. But, he did need to have a CPAP to help him breath, an IV for fluids, and a feeding tube.
The next 4 days were pure hell for me. With a combination of high doses of narcotic medications to help control my pain (which I found out don't work for me), not being able to get up and move around and the fact that I just had major abdominal surgery where my insides were exposed to the dry air for 5 1/2 hours, I contracted something called ileus. It basically meant that my colon/intestines were in shock, and stop moving anything through. I was horribly sick. The worst kind of sick. I couldn't really move, I couldn't stand the smell of anything, I couldn't stand to watch anyone else eat, I couldn't stand my pain level, and couldn't take anymore narcotic drugs to help control it. I simply had to wait for my insides to start working again, and while I waited, I was sicker than I have ever been in my whole life. Because of this, I wasn't able to travel to Children's to see Carter on a few of those days, which just made me feel worse. The fact that I could hear babies crying in the rooms next to me just made me want to scream! I was so jealous of all those mother's who got to have their healthy babies in their rooms. I was beside myself.
Thankfully on Tuesday, I started to be able to tolerate some clear liquids without getting too sick, but I also got the news that I needed another blood transfusion (my 9th) and needed to also get 10 bags of potassium through my IV to help stabilize my blood levels.
I was surprised when the doctor told me that if I could hold down some solid food, I would be able to go home on Wednesday! I was both excited and nervous to leave. I didn't know if I was quite ready, but when the time came, I was ready to bust out of that place and never look at that damn room ever again!
With mixed emotions, we took off for home . . . we were so very excited to get home to the girls . . . I hadn't been home since June 21st! But we were sick about having to leave Carter behind. It was good to be home and good for the girls, and we were back the very next morning.
Carter has been progressing at first, little by little, and now seems to be off and running in the right direction.
(under the billy lights with his cool dude shades on)
He is now completely off oxygen and our next hurdles will be to regulate his body temperature and also learn how to eat. We are hoping he catches on fast, but I have been told that preemie babies are a little bit slower to learn. We are hoping that this big boy is a big eater!
I can't thank you all enough for all your prayers. Please keep them coming! Things are going well, but we are certainly not out of the woods yet.
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