Choanal Atresia Updates

I will keep updating this throughout the day with surgery. But here was the last look we had of him (before we followed him down to the operating room).


I will keep updating this throughout the day with surgery. But here was the last look we had of him (before we followed him down to the operating room).

11:00a -- they came early to take mr. malachi to surgery. we were expecting more around the 1:00 hour, as was our nurse. because of the early arrival for the transport, he was as sedated and paralyzed as they were planning. (our attending physician wanted to personally monitor his sedation and that sort of thing due to the funny heart rhythms he has been experiencing the past couple days). after they had put malachi in his first isolette to be taken downstairs, they were having problems with his ventilator system. this is him being transferred from one isolette to the other.

12:15p -- support nurse just came by to let us know not much has taken place. anesthesia and surgery are just verifying iv access points and deciding if they need anything more than the IV that has been placed in his foot yesterday.

1:15p -- support nurse came by to update. they had gotten started on the procedure around 12:15-12:30. she thinks the next time we hear anything, it will be from the doctor after they are finished.

3:00 -- we finished up lunch with Pastor Mark who generously had run out to get us some lunch. went in to visit malachi back in his nicu bed. i was okay with the bloody gauze under his nose and the limp body, but i was not ready for the nurse to describe the blood "spurting" out of his nose. she seemed kind of freaked out by it, so the combination made this mommy pretty queasy. dr. engle had put his arm around me, which immediately sent me to tears. all things considered, he looks great. i think just the craziness of his life is catching up with me and the severity of the obstacles he has already been able to overcome. i was going to post a picture, but we'll wait til he gets cleaned up a bit more.

5:30 -- not an easy recovery-for me or for baby. i do not handle blood or IVs well; therefore, a combination of the two is not great. malachi's iv went bad and they had to take it out. they tried for over half an hour before they were able to find another good spot for it and successfully get it set up in his hand. his nose is still bleeding. they got it to clot for a little while, but right after they got it cleaned up to the point where i could look at him without getting TOO queasy, it started bubbling again. he was flailing around, so they gave him some more sedation medication and used some blankets to kind of tuck around him and keep him in place. our nurse wants to give him some more morphine or some type of pain meds, but his blood pressure is too low for her to do so. his sedation is kind of wearing off and you can tell he is in pain. i just want my baby better. here is a pic of him cleaned up before he started bleeding again.

bonus pic: sweet scar from open heart surgery a couple weeks ago.

8:45p -- well, john and i left to eat some dinner at around 7:00. at that time, i'm pretty sure he had stopped bleeding at that point. when we got back the bloody nose bubbles had started up again and the low-dose paralytic meds they gave him earlier had started wearing off. we are under the impression now that the ENT doctor is planning on returning to the hospital to take a look at him again.


more to come...