Saturday, February 21, 2009

Surgery

Ok, I know I should have updated this sooner, but its been a hectic week and I have a few minutes to spare so will quickly inform all my prayer warriors how Nick's surgery went.
Nick was wheeled away at 2:20pm and I went to sit in the waiting room. At about 2:45 I was called to the front desk to be informed that surgery just started and they would let me know when it was complete. I was told about 1.5 hours. So I played some spider solitare, talked to a friend on the phone and tried to keep myself busy so my mind wouldn't dwell to the "what if's". At 3:45 my in laws showed up with the boys and we sat and talked and waited for the surgery to be over. At 4:15 I was called to the front desk where I saw Dr. Miller who was the neurosurgeon. He had a smile on his face and at that moment I knew God had answered all my prayers and all your prayers....a perfect surgery. Dr. Miller said he was very surprised to find that the Herniation of the disk had more or less turned into a big buldge. (this means that it was not so big that it was touching the spinal cord causing the nerve to be pinched), but that it was still a good thing to have the surgery done as you never know when it could flare back up and cause pain again. So come to find out this explains why the friday before surgery nick commented "I dont' seem to have as much pain...what should we do...go ahead with the surgery"??? Even though we didn't have a second MRI we decided we would go ahead with this surgery since you never know when that pain may reoccur. Dr Miller continued to say nick did well and was in recovery and would be moved up to a room within the next two hours. So we continued to wait and about an hour later we were told he had a room. So we headed up to his room just as he was being moved onto his bed. We went in and he looked like he had just come out of surgery. Its a bit disturbing seeing the one you love to much look in pain and groggy and out of it. The boys were extremely quiet but oh so sweet. Caden walked up to him and started patting his arm and head and saying "you ok daddy". Elijah stood back quietly and looked quite sad. I soon noticed that his IV was bleeding out the end of the tube and so I called in the nurse. She proceeded to change the tubing and I think that was when Elijah got worried. Seeing daddy's blood was maybe a bit to much for him. I told him what was going on and told him it was ok and if he needed to cry that was ok too, but that daddy was fine. Elijah stuck his fingers to his eyes and held them over the corners of his eyes to keep from crying and then he came and sat by me and hid his face. I thought how precious it was that he was so concerned. Soon the tube was changed and the bleeding was done and the boys became their normal self.
Nick had not eaten all day and they offered him food and of course he was hungry but unfortunently he over did it and ate to much and threw it up later on that night. He slept like a log as he snored all night long:) I slept(or should I say tried to sleep in a hard pull out chair) as best as I could at 7 months pregnant. I was glad to see the sun rise in the morning:). Nick was dismissed the next day by 11:00am and we were home by 11:30. The doctor gave orders for him to not go back to work for 6 weeks....WHAT??? Nick said "that is not possible", you never told me I couldn't work for 6 weeks. Well, nick got him to drop it down to 2 weeks. Im not 100% sure he is going to follow doctors orders at this point. I think nick is hoping to go back late next week which only puts him at staying away from work for 1 week. I can't make him stay home, but I sure hope he doesn't over do it!!!!!
Anyway, thanks so much for your prayers and support thru this journey we had to take. We are both so thankful he is pain free in the leg with no sciatic nerve problems what so over...now he just has to let the incision heal and become pain free (that is the only pain he has). He still has 6 weeks of a 10 pound restriction which he must follow and he says he will. That puts us at 3 days before I am due....oh this could be interesting:)

Hope this wasn't to confusing...I tried to explain the best I could.