Day 1

We are in Baltimore for a bit for Hannah to get a limb-lengthening surgery. We feel blessed beyond blessed and then a little more blessed with some blessings on the side that we have found a doctor who feels confident in being able to do some good work on Hannah's leg. Add to that a rad little house/hotel across the street from the hospital for us to stay at that has plenty of folks going through the same thing roaming the halls, ready to comfort and guide you back to sanity when you are like, "Holy heck this just happened!! Is it supposed to happen? Did I ruin everything? Am I a ruiner???," it's just nice.

I want to keep a little blog journal while we're here for any Mom that might be coming up on this type of surgery for her child so she can know what to expect. We'll see if it lasts longer than any of my previous two-day forays into blogging. I do still have five children and the desire to just eat cookies and think nothing at the end of the day is strong.

So day 1, boring, horrible, awful, I-don't-want-to-look-at-my-phone-one-more-time-but-I-don't-know-what-else-to-do-with-my-brain day. Dan took Hannah in early to get all the pre-op stuff done. I got the kids up and breakfast and such. Then my brother-in-law and his wife arrived and I found plenty of other stuff that I just HAD to do before I went over to sit with Hannah. Then Dan called and said, "Are you on your way? Hannah is about to go back and she wants you to go back with her." When he said that I realized what I'd been avoiding all morning - having to go back to the OR with Hannah to watch her struggle against the gas mask and then fall asleep in such a horrible, gone, eyes-rolled-back-in-her-head sort of way. I'm ridiculous, so I cry every time. Having a child go into surgery gives me the same thoughts that I have whenever I have a baby. It seems like such an incredibly awesome idea right up until the moment that it actually happens and I'm feeling the discomfort. Then I can't keep the, "What was I thinking? Why in the heck did I do this to myself again!" thoughts from screaming through my skull.

But after I dropped off Hannah - Boringsville, the waiting game. Between her being in the OR and then the PACU we spent 8 or 9 hours trying to force entertainment out of our phones.

She woke up not-super-grumpy from her sleep which was exciting, and by the time she was up in her room on the Peds floor and settled in she was ready to eat mac and cheese and watch Barbie movies to her hearts content. She and I blew it and ate waaaaaaaay toooooooo muuuuuuch post-surgery so she got a bit of a belly ache, but other than that her epidural kept her as comfy as a bunny in it's burrow. She did stay up all night the first night since she had slept so hard all day. But it was generally a much, much, much, much better situation than I anticipated.

And that was Day 1.