Surgery #5

We have a surgery date!!! Eli will be going in for his hiatal hernia/ paralyzed diaphragm surgery on Wednesday August 7th (yes like in a few days).

We had our 2nd surgery consultation yesterday morning at Hope and this time the surgeon, Dr. Lobe, was actually prepared and ready to talk surgery. He came in, looked over some papers and spit out the game plan at us. We agreed and we were on our way within minutes. The nurse was trying to schedule us for sometime in September for when the doctors next free day was and he insisted we get in next week. Something must have clicked with him and he realized that it was me who called the cardiac surgeon on him to get this ball rolling because he was very apologetic and actually placed importance on us. 

So let's talk medical......the surgery the doctor is doing has three possible approaches towards it, I'll explain the best I can. Due to Eli's obvious medical history and his freshly worked on beautiful heart of his, the doctor is going to try the least invasive way of surgery. He wants to mess with Eli as little as possible and put the least amount of strain on his heart. The technical name is thoracoscopy repair of a thoracic (hiatal) hernia. This means he will be going into the chest cavity around the rib cage with a tube and will try to expand his chest and fix everything that way. If that doesn't work he will try to do the surgery laparoscopic surgery which will be a few small incisions.  If that doesn't work Eli will be having his stomach opened for a second time, we are hoping it doesn't require that. I would bet that it ends up being the 2nd shot at it that really works. I did hear the doctor say to put him down for a 3 hour surgery. I asked about recovery time in the hospital and the doctor kinda was hesitant to say because we aren't sure how in depth this surgery is going to get. His answer was anywhere from a few days to a few weeks.

I will admit I'm pretty nervous about this surgery, as I am with any surgery but this seems to be a whole different area for me. Eli has had stomach surgery before when he was a month old and I didn't make a big deal about it then. I also didn't realize how big the scars were going to be and that his g-tube site would end up looking like a second belly button. I call this a stomach surgery but it's in fact in his chest cavity, but since they aren't cracking his chest open again its different. Does that make any sense? Maybe because I feel like this hernia has had a huge impact on his stomach i.e. his lack of weight gain since November, his small little appetite, the way his stomach gurgles like crazy as water is going in. Oh well I'm rambling now.

So Tuesday night I'll be getting a call about what time surgery will be and what time Eli has to stop eating and drinking (always a blast!). I'm hoping because his surgery seems pretty difficult compared to this doctors usual circumcision (I saw his schedule was loaded with them) etc surgeries that we'll be put in an early time slot. So wish us luck, send us prayers and good thoughts! My little man is a tough little cookie but he hates doctors and hospitals now and it breaks our hearts. I will update as soon as possible!