Post-Op Report

Gracie had her surgery from 4:00-6:00 this afternoon. First, ENT (Ears, Nose and Throat) went in and took a better look down her throat to see if there was any structural damage to her organs that was making her cough and gag. He came out to the waiting room and told us that he did not see anything wrong which is good news in the sense that she does not have to have surgery of any kind to fix it. Bad, in the sense that she is just going to have to grow out of all of her coughing on her own.....hopefully she does it sometime soon! Next, they did an echo on her heart. From what we heard, there are no more blood clots, which is GREAT news! Bad news is that they still want her treated for the clots for about 2 more months (shots twice a day in the leg!) Lastly, the plastic surgeon did her skin graft. He said it went well, he put the wound vac back on and will take it off on Friday to see how it looks. About 25 minutes after surgery we went in to see Gracie in the PICU. She was quite agitated and fussy. The nurse said that this is a common reaction to coming off the anesthesia. They gave her morphine to calm her down and she was doing well when we left for the evening. The bandage that they had wrapped her wounded leg in, was wrapped so tight it was turning her leg purple and cutting off her circulation. So the nurse unwrapped it and we were able to look at the skin graft site through the clear bandage. It seems to be a good portion of her upper thigh. Poor baby. They said that it will leave a scar. Somewhat of a pink, birth mark looking scar. The surgeon also stitched above and below the graft on her chest along the incision line because it was not looking too pretty either. Oh yeah, most important of all.......Gracie came out of surgery extubated!! I did not have to see her with the breathing tube in at all, thank goodness. So, all in all, it went very well. We pray that her wound will not get infected or take an unusually long time to heal. This is the only thing keeping us at the hospital at this point. Last night my dad stayed over with Gracie, and the night before, my mom and step dad stayed the night with her. She did pretty well with only about 1 hour sessions of being awake/and or fussy. Gracie has a lot of people who love her and are willing to take care of her. We are very thankful for that. Also, I gave Gracie her first shot last night. (SAD!) I had practiced on my nurse believe it or not, earlier in the day. She suggested that I practice on her with a vile of saline. It is really not to hard. Then later that night, I had to give the shot to my sweet baby. But at least I did it and it was not too traumatic! So for now they are going to watch Gracie overnight in the PICU with the intention of transferring her back up to the third floor tomorrow morning.

p.s. Max and Taylor did a great job in the Dance Festival at school today. Max did square dancing (in a group with a GIRL!) and Taylor did the Hukie Louw (sp?) It was a lot of fun to come and see them, our nieces, nephew, friends and neighbors. Good job guys!!