Anticipating first surgery

Well, Sean Michael's lip repair is still set for March 24. Here are some updates. Notice today sarcasm seems to be my coping mechanism of choice.

We had pre-op visits with the surgeon and anesthesiologist on March 2nd and got more info about the whole deal. Here are some things to look forward to:

• He can have breastmilk until up to 4 hours before our scheduled surgery time. Unfortunately, he eats every 2.5 hours and our scheduled time is the time we arrive at the hospital and then who knows how long we'll have to wait before they are ready to put him under. We are not looking forward to that part.



• They'll give him a sedative and said it will be the first time we'll see our baby drunk. hmmm...



• We get to hold him and walk all the way to the operating room doors before handing him over to the doctors.



• They'll remove his NAM and keep it as part of his medical record. We do not get to keep the NAM. I better take pictures!


• The surgery will take around 6 hours. Dr. Kuang said not to be worried if it went longer. It would just mean they are taking their time. Attn Portland people. This would be a good day to come and visit / distract us at the hospital if you are free. :)


• He'll stay one night in the hospital during which time he'll be on pain meds.



• He'll wear arm restraints called "no-no's" for 3 weeks so that he can't bend his arms and get at his surgery site.



• In the hospital, a nurse will come ever few hours and wash his incision sites and then clean off any scabs that have begun to form. did I say every few hours? It may be as often as every 2 hours. Turns out, my sister Brianna, who is in nursing school, performed this task during a clinical rotation at Shriner's hospital in Portland. She said the baby screams through it. Yeah.


• Even better news! We get to continue performing this glorious task over the following two weeks. The self absorbing stitches will fall out while we are cleaning the scabs between 5 and seven days post op. Good thing we hear good things about this surgeon.


• After two weeks we switch from scab removal to massage. I'm not sure what we'll use to massage the scar. I have some research to do. I heard vitamin E can be irritating to some babies. I welcome any ideas. You can post a comment or e-mail me.
  
  More later!