Urethral Surgery #3

We are settled back in after a day at the hospital. As always, we experienced the hospital time warp where things went really slowly yet oddly fast. When we checked into our room this morning I was overjoyed to see our FAVORITE anesthesiologist's name on the board. Dr. A has taken amazing care of Elijah during some of his biggest surgeries, so I had to refrain from hugging him when he walked into the room.

The surgeon today was a cohort of Dr. R's, so not our usual doctor. Elijah kept referring to her as "Dr. R's sub." :) The surgery went smoothly and quickly, but we got news we weren't expecting. The doctor thought that despite intermittent cathing (which we'll have to do daily for the next six months), this is just a patch. Within a year or two Elijah will need a much bigger surgery that sounded like a pretty big deal. One step at a time! First we have to get him through a week of being cathed and we will take it from there. We will also pray for another miracle!

He was SO brave today, even with the "scary mask." We got him a pack of Pokemon cards immediately afterward as a reward for his bravery. He was SO groggy when he woke up that he could hardly form words and he kept asking the same questions over and over. Once we got him up and moving he improved quickly. By the time we got home he was requesting a grilled cheese sandwich and tomato soup (fave comfort foods). He ate endlessly and I even caught him in the fridge devouring cottage cheese straight from the container. :)

We are praying that the cathing goes smoothly at school for the next few days. We have communicated with the school nurse and she is going to help him "drain" 3x/day, which is a huge blessing. If needed, I can go in and help, too. It really is amazing how secretive they make cathing these days. No one will ever know what's going on unless Elijah spills the beans. :) And great news for him! He doesn't have to use the toilet nearly as often! :)

I have to say that on days like today it sure does help to have a faith in God. SO many times today, I just deferred to Him. I trusted his promises and let Him hold all of us. We are feeling strong, confident and faithful and that has nothing to do with our strength.

I'll end with some hospital-related funnies. All of the below occurred after Elijah had taken Versed (the pre-surgery med that alleviates anxiety)..

Dr A asked if he was going to do Kung fu while they tried to put the mask over his mouth. Elijah held up Pikachu (Pokemon stuffed animal) and said, "No, but you better watch out for THIS little fella!"

A doctor asked him if he was nervous and E answered yes. The doctor asked what specifically he was nervous about and he said, "Whatever this thing is that you're doing to me."

And when Dan put on a gown to take him back to the OR, Elijah said, "Dad, you're a pretty lady! You should put on make-up!"

Surgery, Santa and thankfulness.

Elijah did great today! Surgery was quick, with an easy recovery. It was one of the better recoveries from anesthesia that we've seen. I have been careful about saying what the surgery was all about in order to give him some semblance of privacy. It's sort of a private ordeal, so I don't want to scream about it from the rooftops. Catch me in person or over email and I'll explain! He was in a bit of pain afterward and had a mild fever. We will stay on top of pain meds through the night.

Elijah was, again, terrified of the mask. :( Also, again, terrified of removing the IV tape. I am thankful this is behind us! He was such a brave boy today. I could see signs of him being more self-aware than ever before, which was encouraging. He was able to recognize that he was feeling scared about specific things and he was willing to try tactics to not be so afraid. This is a first!

Dan and I always feel so terrible watching him endure pain, both physical and emotional, so we always allow him to pick out a toy afterward for being brave. So that Sammy never feels left out, we let him pick something out, too, for being a good and supportive brother. Today we picked out a toy for both boys to share, a new Lego Movie lego set! They were both SO EXCITED. Oh my goodness, they were happy boys!

One thing Elijah said repeatedly today in the midst of his discomfort was, "MOMMY! I miss you!" When I finally asked what he meant by that, he said that he missed me when I have to be at work so much. :( Ok, this kind of kills me. Obviously we all need to work, but I have been working an exceptional amount lately and obviously it is affecting our family. If Elijah can verbalize it, it means something. Thankfully things will start to slow down soon.

Here is the boys' photo taken with Santa from last weekend! (yes, I believe Santa's bare belly may be showing..)

Tomorrow will be busy, but I'm hoping we can take some time to breathe and be THANKFUL. We have so much to be thankful for. I am looking forward to four days of no work and tons of family time. Friday will be our annual getting-our-Christmas-tree day and we will spend the day decorating our house. We are all looking forward to the next few days! Thanks for checking in and HAPPY THANKSGIVING! Hug your family. Tell them how much you love them. Be thankful!!!!!

Thankful.

Today was a pretty incredible day, and I found myself constantly feeling thankful. We did not know what to expect coming into this surgery. We would rather forget about the last ear surgery, and we didn't know if all or any of that chaos would happen again. We are SO THANKFUL that this was a completely different experience.

(My dad and stepmom have gotten a couple Piggie-Elephant books for the boys and they LOVE them! Elijah insisted on bringing both books with him to the hospital yesterday. He literally snuggled with them before and after surgery....arms wrapped around them while he drifted in and out of sleep. :) Today he wanted to pose for a picture with one of them.)

Elijah had a great day! He woke up feeling good, eating and drinking A LOT and keeping it all down. He played almost at his usual pace, and in true fashion was sassy when interacting with his brother. He complained of mild pain twice, but we began a tylenol-advil schedule that seems to have taken care of any discomfort. We changed his gauze once today and his ear/incision look great! No fever, no dizziness, lots of crazy hair and a big happy smile on our spunky and resilient oldest boy!

I could tell Sammy was happy to be with his family today (the feelings were very mutual). I got lots of hugs and snuggles. After I had put him down for a nap, he called me into his room. "Mommy! You forgot to give me LOVE!" He wrapped himself around my arm and would not let go. "I love you SO MUCH, Mommy. You are the best mommy EVER. I love all of our family." I love that little boy! He is so funny and cute and independent and awesome.

I feel like it would be so easy to forget about the blessings (MIRACLES) that have been thrown our way. Once things are "okay," it is easy to settle back into a routine and forget about answered prayers. Today, I haven't allowed myself to forget. I keep reminding myself to be extra thankful. I keep thinking about where we were at on Day #2 last time and how Elijah couldn't walk in a straight line for many weeks after that surgery. I keep reminding myself about what the doctor told us yesterday. He said that if another surgeon were to do this surgery not knowing E's history, he/she would probably have no idea that his footplate was at one point totally broken in half. Yesterday it appeared to be totally healthy and filled with fluid, which is a miracle based on the reactions we've seen from the doctors and nurses (apparently cracked footplates don't "just heal"). I keep thinking about how many times Elijah has had to endure tape being painfully peeled off his arm and needles poked into him and on and on. And yet he continues to smile. When I think about all of this, his anxieties and struggles make so much sense. I want to never forget any of this and to keep it all in perspective! Please remind me of this when I am struggling to understand something or another! :)

Yesterday Elijah asked questions and made comments that we have never heard before. Here are the ones I can recall:
"Am I going to die?"
"I'm scared."
"I don't want to be alone."
"Will you and Daddy be with me the whole time?"
"After I go to sleep with the mask, will they put the tube in my throat?"
"Will you and Daddy wait in a different room while I have surgery?"
"I miss Sammy! I want to be with him!"
"Why does my throat feel funny after surgery?"
"Will you be there when I wake up?"
"When Daddy comes into the surgery room with me, is he a nurse?"

For the first time ever, he was thinking ahead and also expressing feelings surrounding surgery and time in the hospital. He has not ever done this before, not even a little bit. I never want my boys to worry, but this is definitely a sign that Elijah is maturing! I wonder if he has just been unable to make sense of these things in the past and is finally able to express the words/feelings verbally. It makes me a little sad to think that he has perhaps been holding all of these questions/thoughts in because he has been trying to make sense of them. At any rate, I was happy to hear him rattling off questions and I am MORE than happy to provide answers!

If my surgery equation is correct (one week of healing is needed for every day spent in the hospital), we should have another 6 days before we are back on track! We do not have much planned in the next few weeks and I did that on purpose. Hopefully there will be lots of time relaxing at the dropzone and time spent together and with friends and family. After a few months of TONS of activity, I'm looking forward to a laid back July!

Thanks for checking in! Wishing you all a wonderful week!

Home with a vomiting asterisk

We are home! Elijah has thrown up a handful of times since leaving the hospital, so we are on dehydration alert. Dan and I both feel like it is anesthesia vomit as opposed to inner ear vomit (this is a good thing). We are hoping his tummy will settle overnight and that he will feel much better in the morning. It took him a while to wake up after surgery. He was soooo groggy and sleepy.

Around 4:30 we woke him up to give him juice, just so we could see if his tummy could handle it. He had nausea for most of the rest of the time we were at the hospital, but he didn't throw up until we left.

As always, the worst part of the ordeal was taking the tape off of his IV. Oh my goodness, this is so highly traumatic! I am personally going to invent something that can allow doctors and nurses to bypass having to place tape directly on skin. There just has to be a way! Without this, I think he would have had very minimal anxiety. One of my two favorite lines from the day occurred while the nurse and I worked on the IV tape. Elijah said, "This is NOT ok, Nursey!" :) My second favorite line was said on the way home. I sat in the back seat next to him because he wanted me to hold his head while also holding his puke bag up to his mouth. Then his left eye started to itch, so he wanted me to hold his soft blankie up to his eye. He saw that I couldn't do all three things, so he said, "Can you PLEASE have three hands, Mom?!"

We wheeled Elijah to the car as he held a bag to his face, just in case. He actually moved the bag aside and smiled when I took out Dan's phone to take a picture. That's our boy! 

We will watch him closely through the night. Hopefully his tummy settles and he will feel a ton better in the morning. He hasn't felt any pain yet, so we are hoping we keep that under control, as well.

We're also praying that the prosthetic device Dr. L placed in his ear will restore some/most of his hearing! We won't know this for a few weeks, but we will pray hard in the meantime. That's all for tonight. Please forgive me for any typos or things that may not make sense. We are tired! Also, grateful (for so many things) and ready for a new day tomorrow. Thank you for PRAYING and for checking in on us!!

Breathing again

After much prayer and anticipation, Elijah's first (half) day back at school was a success! Elijah told us that Ms. W (his special ed case mgr) told him he had a "great" day. We'll take it! He was so excited to show us a picture one of his classmates had drawn for and given to him today. He arrived back home in a great mood! We are hoping for many more of these days. He will do half days for the next four weeks and at that point we will possibly move to full days again (gulp).

I know I've said this before, but we are so grateful for Ms. W. She took time out of her morning to give me a call and let me know everything was going well with E. She told me some specifics, like that he was very quiet and attentive during circle/story time and that his classmates treated him like he was a celebrity when they saw him this morning. :)

Elijah even made it to karate tonight for the first time in almost 2 months. We're getting back into the swing of things! Yay! We are finally beginning to breathe again since surgery. I'm thinking there is a mathematical formula here. For every one day spent in the hospital, a week of recuperation is needed. Write that down! It's science!

Have a great week, no matter how cold! Brrr! Thanks for checking in.

Rollercoaster

A small amount of Valium did the trick today! Elijah slept for THREE solid hours this afternoon and woke up feeling great! I was able to sneak some serious snuggle time in there, which I loved. He experienced no nausea, vomiting or dizziness for the rest of the day. He was much more steady on his feet and was almost back to his usual spunky self (not totally, but almost). He had a huge dinner and was a bottomless pit, asking for more and more and more mac & cheese, please!

We aren't sure how often to administer the Valium. His body (vestibular system) obviously needs it on some level right now, but we also have to be careful not to over-medicate, creating an Elijah Zombie. I have an idea that I will attempt tonight and report back. Pray it works!

Thanks for the continued prayers!

Brotherly love

I heard this coming from the backseat today on our way home from Ikea: "Elijah, will you hold my hand?" I turned around to see the sweetest brotherly love. I love my boys! 

We finally got Sammy a big-boy bed! We'll put it together tomorrow so he can say goodbye to the crib he has been sleeping in for 3.5 years! He keeps saying, "I am NOT a baby! I am a BIG BOY!" Yes you are, sweet boy.

Elijah had a much more alert day today after being free of the Valium. He is still super wobbly when walking, but he is definitely doing better than yesterday. Each new day brings amazing progress! I have some worries about some things his eyes are doing, but I'll share about that later to avoid comments from the peanut gallery (unwarranted comments make me anxious).

Dan and I were able to get out of the house ALONE tonight for a bit, thanks to our amazing friend and babysitter Sam. She watched the boys for free so we could have a few hours to ourselves. We are so happy Sam is pursuing her dreams in college, but we miss her tremendously. No one compares to her. She has such a special bond with both of our boys and we are very grateful that she is a part of our lives!

Thanks for checking in! Wishing you all the very best this week!

Week of recovery (for Mom)

The week for Elijah has been just as normal as can be! That boy is unfazed and always spunky and positive. His attitude is a constant reminder for me of what kind of attitude I should have! A couple times since Monday I have mentioned to him that we need to start getting used to the "scary mask" since we will need to see it again soon. Elijah responds with, "NO SCARY MASK!" We brought one home with us, and at first he wanted to flush it down the toilet. I have seen him checking it out a few times since and finally talked him into putting it on Lamby. He agreed, but refused to smile (even though you can tell he wanted to).

Life for Dan and me this week has been a little bit sad. I cried a lot for the first two days and nights after we found out about the newest "thing." Then yesterday morning I woke up MAD. Elijah doesn't deserve all of this! I felt like I wanted to punch and kick the cr@p out of a punching bag. So I think I will do that soon. :) I refuse to go back to the dark place I was at two years ago when we found out about his third open heart surgery. I will not go back there, I will not, I will not!

One of the boys' favorite things to do is play Disney Junior games on my computer. Most of the time they sit nicely next to each other. Today was one of those times, so I took a series of cute photos.

Silly brothers.

This is my fault. I told them to kiss each other, so they did. I hope this doesn't embarrass them one day.

Here are a few pics from the hospital that I didn't get a chance to post. The new hospital family waiting area is AMAZING. Elijah loves driving around in these little cars. One of these next times he isn't going to fit in them anymore, but for now they are still tons of fun!

Elijah's little Lamby is his favorite "guy" (girl?) right now. He adores her, and I think it is so cute and sweet. He introduced her to everyone he encountered in the hospital, and not one person mentioned the fact that maybe she was a girl's toy. I appreciated that.  

Here was our post-hospital pic when Dan was picking Sammy up from Grandpa's house. Notice how rested and happy Elijah looks? And how tired I look? Who was the one who got anesthesia?! :)

I was able to have a lunch date with my littlest love this week! Our little Sammy loves home and he loves his family just as much as we love him. On Monday when the rest of us were spending the day at the hospital, Sammy was spending time with his Auntie and Grandpa. He LOVES both of them dearly, but the following day I felt like he was upset with me. How dare you leave me for an entire day, mama! So I figured some one-on-one time was in order.

And here is the lovely scene that is our front yard right now. The ice that had built up on our driveway was so thick that it was nearly impossible to dig into. It has just kept growing and growing over this icy, snowy, cold winter, so Dan went to work on it and did a great job getting rid of the ice. Now it is an ice mountain in our yard! And literally overnight, our driveway is a skating rink again. You should see me carrying my 43-pound son to and from the bus on a sloped skating rink every morning, slipping and sliding all over the place. The kids on the bus must get a good laugh!

The boys have been saying and doing so many funny things lately, as they always are. I will save those for another post. For now, I must retreat to the couch for a bit before bed. Thanks for checking in! Have a great weekend!

Heart cath aftermath

We are home. It was a weird, long day, and we are grateful to be back in the comfort of our home. We completely expected to spend the night in the hospital tonight, so we are extra happy to be here.

Here is a photo of Elijah literally just before I told him that the nurses needed to draw his blood. He was having such a good time driving around the unit in his fire truck, so the mood changed quickly once he started anticipating pain.



Dr. G showed us some detailed photos of Elijah's heart and lungs today. He reminded us that Elijah's lungs and arteries are far from normal, which is the reason he needs caths so often. Those little pulmonary arteries of his are constantly changing, and not necessarily in good ways. Stenting, ballooning and coiling will be a part of his life for a long time to come.

We did learn two very positive things today! Dr. G shared with us that since Elijah has only one kidney, that he has peeked at his functioning kidney during every single one of his eight heart caths. I appreciate this! I have never known about this before, which is a good thing, because we learned that his kidney has always appeared to be slightly large in relation to his body size. But today his kidney appeared to be a completely normal size! He also checked the function of the kidney and it was completely normal. We love Dr. G!

The other positive thing we learned was that the catheter insertion sites in E's groin on the right side still look great and are still functional. It is common for a child who has had as many caths as Elijah to have non-functioning sites due to overuse. He is very lucky in this area, especially since he will need many more heart caths.



Elijah had two popsicles (one orange and one grape!) before we left the hospital. He also had a handful of crackers and some juice.



On the drive home, he threw it all up in the car. Twice. At least it smelled fruity! :) His tummy obviously wasn't feeling great, so we got him home and cleaned him (and the car) up. He was acting VERY tired, so we put him right to bed. We are praying for a healing and very restful night of sleep tonight!

Sammy spent the day with Auntie Christine and his cousins. He seems to have had a great time! He was a ball of energy tonight, running around, stealing cookies from the pantry and swiping his brother's tired face.

We appreciate the prayers today! Thank you all so much!

....still healing

Lately when I come here to write a post, I sit down and think.....poashigoauwerhgiuehgah. I don't know what to say anymore. I'd love to tell you that we are all doing great. Well, I CAN tell you that Elijah and Sammy are doing great. And I don't want to speak for Dan, but I would not always describe my state of mind as "great."

Intermission....cute cute Sammy...



He's so stinkin' sweet. We love this little boy to pieces. He is SO ATTACHED to Dan and me. It is good and bad. Good when he is wrapping his chubby arms around our necks, but bad when we have to leave him at daycare. :( Or leave him in another room. He is only happy when he is in our arms.



Intermission done.

I have never in my life experienced such intense emotion. The months leading up to surgery were insane. The anxiety was indescribable. Then, surgery happened, and it was a breeze compared to our last two times. And then we got home and.....what the heck?! I didn't know what to feel. My tanks (emotional, physical, mental, everything, etc.) were on empty, so I (not speaking for hubby) have been doing the bare minimum. Care for children, shower and get dressed, be a good wife, eat food..

We have been spending some time at the dropzone, which has been very therapeutic for me (and I hope for all of us) but at the same time it has made us all tired just because we're not sleeping in our own beds. I feel like we are on a path toward peace, but we aren't quite there. This is a tough road. One that cannot be explained unless you have been through it.

Thanks for checking in on us. We appreciate and love you all so much!

Wots of snuggles

Elijah's post-surgery check-up went great today. Dr. G thought he looked amazing! I mentioned the blood pressure concerns and he took me seriously (LOVE him). Even after the nurse had checked his BP in both his arm and his leg (by my request), Dr. G checked it again himself. There was still a discrepancy, but he felt ok with it. He confirmed that the pressures in his arm are the most important, and Dan and I both felt good hearing that from him. We talked about this on the way home...there is just something about hearing comforting words from Elijah's very own doctor. It means so much more than hearing it from anyone else. We adore Dr. G.



An aside: Elijah has been asking more than usual lately for snuggles. "MOM! Pweeeeease come snuggle wif me! Please wub mine hair!" I NEVER NEVER EVER turn down this request.



Elijah's xray looked great today. His new valve function looks great and he has no fluid retention, which is all awesome news. His incision also looks perfect. We are cutting his Lasix dose in half and continuing with the Enalapril until we see Dr. G again, which will be in four weeks. I asked about sending Elijah to daycare and he said it is ideal to hold off for one month from the date of surgery. We will do our best to make sure this happens.

I haven't mentioned since surgery how grateful we are for Dr. K, Elijah's pulmonologist. His PLAN, the one that kept E from getting post-extubation croup, was a total success. I will never forget walking into Elijah's room after extubation and seeing a completely croup-free boy and being totally blown away. I looked back and forth between the nurse and the respiratory therapist like, REALLY?!?!!? A huge blessing is knowing one of Dr. K's awesome nurses, so I asked her what the best way to thank him would be. She suggested leaving a nice voicemail on his pager, so I plan to do that this week. Hopefully I can hold the tears back. He is one of the most amazing doctors we have ever met. His dedication and love for his job is inspiring. There are not many people like him!

And we still have to think of ways to thank our beloved Dr. G and Dr. M.

Despite the good appointment today, Dan and I are feeling a bit more down than usual. This has been such a life-changing experience and we aren't quite sure how to handle it all yet. We continue to pray for peace and normalcy. Thanks for all of your good thoughts and prayers. We appreciate you all so much.

Healing

Elijah, one week after OHS. Incredible!



The past week has been surreal. I still can't believe things went so smoothly with Elijah's surgery and part of me is waiting for the other shoe to drop. The amount of anxiety I experienced between mid-February and June 10th is gross. So now that surgery is done, I'm left with....what? Where does all of that anxiety go? Does it turn into something else? Does it just go away? I still feel a good deal of sadness, but I also feel relief and happiness. Hopefully with a bit of time normalcy will return.

We have gotten out of the house a tiny bit since returning home, and we have even spent some time at the dropzone (Elijah's favorite place).



Elijah is doing great. Most of the time he has crazy amounts of energy and he runs around like a wild man. He has a post-surgery check-up tomorrow with Dr. G. I'm curious to see what his blood pressure is at and if there is still a big difference between his arms and his legs.



Sammy has been great, too. He is such a good baby. He is very patient with his big brother's sassiness and unwillingness to share.



Sam has been sucking his thumb more than ever. If anything upsets him, his thumb goes into his mouth immediately. He likes to crawl into my arms and snuggle up to me while he sucks away at it. He can say "BA" for "ball," "DA" for "Dad," "MA" for "Mama" and "AH-DUH" for "all done." He is taking tiny steps on his own. He can successfully take two steps and then he will fall down and giggle.



We are slowly working at removing the sticky tape residue from all over Elijah's body. It is hard to get off! And Elijah screams any time I even look at it, so it's been a slow process. It looks like we are a family of vampires!



That's all for now! Thanks for checking in..

Battle wounds

I am not the mom who comes home from the hospital and attempts to immediately wash off all of the "hospital dirt." Removing stickers and tape and anything sticky from Elijah's body is traumatic for him, so I tend to just let it be. He has been through enough. The stickiness will come off eventually.

Elijah found his toy stethoscope this morning and had it in his ears for most of the morning. I asked him, "Hey Elijah, what do you want to be when you grow up?" He has never had an answer to this question before, but today he said, "DR. GWEMMELS!" :)



It was a beautiful day today. Totally deliciously beautiful. Elijah went back and forth between wanting to be outside and wanting to be on the couch. He has done an amazingly good job of limiting himself and listening to his body. There were times when he would sit his bottom on the couch and ask for a movie and chill for an hour or two. And there were other times when he was all over the place, playing like a crazy man. A couple times today I looked at Dan and said, "Really? He had heart surgery less than a week ago??"



Sammy has definitely been affected by our broken schedule for the past week. He is extra clingy and not being his usual happy self. Every time I hold him tight to my chest, he sucks his little thumb for comfort. That's something he usually only does at bedtime. Hopefully in the next days/weeks he will realize that his family isn't going anywhere! We love our chubby Sammy so much.



We are in the throes of surgery aftermath. Unless you have experienced it, you might think it sounds crazy. We should feel nothing but relief, right? After surgery #1, I was blown away by the emotion that followed hospital recovery. After surgery #2, I had forgotten about that emotion until it happened again and then I quickly remembered. This time, I knew it was coming, but that hasn't made it any easier. Every time I look at Elijah I thank God a thousand times. I have been crying a lot in the past few days. Happy tears, tears of relief, tears of sadness, tears of total joy and painful tears plague me all at once and all the time. This is an indescribable experience.



I saw on the doctor's discharge orders yesterday that Elijah is not supposed to return to daycare for four weeks. Four weeks?! My first reaction was not a positive one, but then I thought of the reasons for having such rules. And those reasons were confirmed today when my friend Jess graciously came to our house to bring us lunch. She almost picked Elijah up under the arms, so I had to quickly share his limitations. That just shows that it is instinct to want to pick up a cute little boy. Dan and I have to be Elijah's constant advocates right now. He has to be in the best care possible...with us! So, we will figure something out.



Elijah is doing great. He is so funny and full of energy. He is constantly making us laugh. Every night before bed I say prayers with him and sing songs. Here's an example of one of his recent prayers: "Thank you, Jesus, for this day. Thank you for Mommy, Daddy, Elijah and Sammy. Thank you for Gwammie and Gwamps and Gwamma and Gwampa. Thank you for cars to drive and food to eat and toys to share. Thank you for comfy beds and for our new tway-wer and our new wittle kitchen. Thank you for drawers and doors. Amen. OH! And thank you for curtains. Amen. OHHH! And thank you for pictures! AMEN!"



That's all I have for now. We continue to heal as a family in so many ways. Thank you so much for the prayers and support. We couldn't have gotten through all of this without you all!

So long, hossa-pi-doh!

We are home. I'm in disbelief. The blood pressure discrepancy (the difference between pressures on E's arms and legs) has me feeling slightly uneasy, but we talked to a cardiologist before we left. She said the only reading that truly matters is the one from the arms. Because I'm crazy, I think I'll call Dr. G when he's back in town (he left us to go to Brazil) later this week to get his thoughts.

I have some thoughts brewing in my head, as always after a big surgery, but for now I will let the following photos from the past few days speak for themselves. Thank you, everyone, for the amazing support, whether through prayer or help with food or by visiting or writing or calling or reading this blog. THANK YOU. We feel incredibly loved and we are feeling so very grateful right now for all of you.