Surgery Day

Today started at 3 am, an hour before the alarm was due to go off.  Thea had allowed Micah to sleep in her room, on a pallet on the floor because his room is being painted, both must have woken during at the night and (shades of Jet Lag 2007), we all were in the same bed.

The night before the kids went over to Thea's friend's house so both Steve and I could attend the 2nd and 3rd grade back-to-school night at Wicoff.  Kalani's parents must have held an exorcism as part of their evening plans because reports were that both Thea and Micah were very well-behaved.  B-to-S night was a complete disappointment after which the full impact of what we once had in the Mandarin-immersion program hit like a meteor.  (It didn't help that PBS showed "Speaking in Tongues" on language immersion programs and seeing a high school student who had been in Mandarin-immersion for about nine years giving a speech in Chinese and a child from the housing projects in San Francisco who was reading to his mother from his Mandarin textbook after being in an immersion program from kindergarten through 2nd grade.)  Not the best night before surgery.

Micah got scooped out of bed at 5 am, plunked into pajamas and a button up shirt and put in his car seat.  Surprisingly in the dark and without the GPS, it was an easy trip other than Micah treating me to "I don't wAAAAnt to have surgery" every five to ten minutes or so.  When we got the Ambulatory Surgery Center's check-in desk he was almost immediately asking the ladies there, "Where's my bracelet?"   And just as she's done twice previously, Shirley put Micah's ID band on and gave Bunny Bear a band, too.

Since this is our third time there, just about everyone looks familiar, and the nurse who took Micah's vitals remembered him (she may have been the PACU nurse's relief when she went to lunch on the first trip to the recovery area).  The anesthesiologist was new, but she was nice enough to get Micah's previous info from medical record (hard copies, no EMRs there) since the anesthesiologist in March was worried about hyperthermia (no, you wrapped a child who sleeps near naked year round in warm blankets and cooked him).  But Micah was scheduled for 7:45 and Medical Records opens at 8 am.  Helpful. 

After Micah got knocked out and settled on the table, I went back out to the pediatric waiting area which is just a small area carved out from the regular waiting area and fasting patients' waiting area.  Several adult patients and the persons accompanying them attempted to sit there, but Shirley waved them off ("THAT'S the PEEEDIATRIC waiting area, you can't sit there) which as the one person sitting there made me feel like the lone leper.

Two hours spent between Facebook, the EMR from work and the Kindle passed quickly.  There was one call from the ER - and after Shirley called me to the desk for the call she proceeded to attempt to untangle her rather fercociously twisted phone cord which made me want to wrap it a few times around her neck.  Just a call from the surgeon saying the right ear was done and he wanted permission to clean out debris from the left canal while Micah was still under anesthesia.  I'd signed Micah's and my life away in terms of consent already, so the call was unnecessary.

Dr. Choe came out a little bit later and said that he'd revised some scarring behind Micah's ear, drilled the bone to make a wider canal, but the reason for Micah's loss of hearing on the right was that scar tissue that formed pulled the tympanic membrane away from the ossicles and not regrowth of bone.  All of which is good news.

About fifteen minutes later I got to go back to the PACU to see my little guy.  He was cranky.  Each time he has had surgery, a different child has come out of the anesthesia.  First surgery:  irritable, crying Micah.  Second time:  peaceful Popsicle eating boy.  This time: sour, cranky boy with nausea.  He had some ice chips and then two little containers of apple juice, and then complained his belly hurt.  So Bunny Bear and I gave belly rubs, we survived a couple of dry heaves and spits and were on our way getting out of there.  We had total parking karma today, and I brought the umbrella stroller so once all the paperwork was signed, I could just pack him in and wheel him out.

Thus ends another atresia surgery.

On the way home we made the obligatory stop at Target where Micah chose just about the most obnoxious, noisy truck on the shelf.  The nice cashier saw Micah's gauze head wrap and just busted out with "WHAT'S WRONG WITH HIS HEAD?" and since it was a cross-cultural thing, I didn't answer with "NOTHING, WHAT'S WRONG WITH YOUR MANNERS?"  On three hours sleep I was not up for being Little Mrs. Atresia Ambassador.

Then we dropped off our purchases at home and brought in the mail, went to Wicoff  School to see Tesh and Thea, then to Steve's office to say hello, then the farm stand in Lawrenceville for the wonderful corn, back to Princeton to the bank, then to pick up Thea at the after school Chinese program and a last stop at the pharmacy in Plainsboro before going home.  Then while I was shucking the corn, Thea and Micah watered the plants in the front yard, fighting for control of the hose the whole time. 

While Thea was doing her homework in the kitchen, Micah finally fell asleep while snuggling on the sofa with me.  Thea, Steve and I ate the corn while Micah was asleep and I got him up to eat his traditional post-surgery dinner of half-dozen steamed dumplings.

Since Micah's room is in a state of upheaval due to having it painted (bye-bye ugly, nicked up royal blue, bye-bye ugly lighthouse border.), color still undecided though leaning to something in the warm light gold spectrum, so he's with us tonight - and he needs to sleep propped up a little bit by pillows.

Follow up appointment is next Wednesday.