Surgery Time...Round 4 :(

My sweet baby boy all snuggled in my arms just minutes before they came & took him away for his surgery. He is so SWEET!!!!

On May 17th the day had come for Ryker's 4th heart surgery....:( My poor baby has been through way too much in his short little life!! 4 Heart Surgeries & 2 Caths at only 2 months old!?!?!? That is just way too much!! No one should have to go through that much in a lifetime, let alone in just two short months! At this point Jason & I had felt like we had just gotten our smiley happy baby boy back! Like in my last post there is a picture of him smiling, he had finally gotten to the point where he did that often & now he has to go back to the O.R :(

When they came to get forms signed & when the surgical team took him away I felt like "okay, this is our 6th time doing this...maybe it will get easier this time around"..........WRONG!! I don't think it will ever get any easier having them tell me all the things "that could happen" then sign my baby's life away regardless of all that they had just warned me of & then walk down to the DREADED 3rd floor with a team full of people that as soon as we hit a certain point they are going to tell me to kiss my baby goodbye AGAIN! This was the first time that I wanted to snap back at them & tell them "No, I don't want to, I am sick of this! This isn't fair!" Why does MY baby have to be the one with the most complex heart? Why can't he just have the original diagnosis that he was given back at my 20 week appointment (Hypo-plastic left heart) That diagnosis was scary enough & I had NO IDEA what his ACTUAL diagnosis really was!!! My poor baby has been through SO much & I wish with all my heart I could take him away from all of this & make him healthy & perfect so he could deal with simple things that babies have to deal with like- weather or not he is hungry or if he needed his diaper changed or for hell sakes the "dreaded" colic! Please God heal him or put me in his place so he doesn't have to go through all this...

I just kept praying that all they had to do was the simple tightening of the PA Band. Dr. DelNido had said before surgery that his plan was to go in, tighten the PA band & then do a specialized kind of echo that goes within & look at his AV Valve regurgitation & see weather or not it had gotten worse, if it hadn't he would sew him up & be done, if not he would have to put Ryker onto the heart & lung machine & then repair the AV Valve which obviously makes the surgery 10 times more serious especially because of the fragile state that Ryker was in going into surgery.

At 11am (he went in at 7am) Jason & I got an update from the liaison nurse, she said that they had just looked at the valve & it had gotten worse & that Ryker would soon be placed on bypass so Dr. DelNido could repair the AV Valve. Jason & I were sick! Suddenly this surgery went from simple to MAJOR & we were terrified!!

As Jason & I sat in the dreaded O.R waiting room I begun having flashbacks of Ryker's very first surgery. All the fears & what if's came rushing back....I suddenly was so unbelievably overwhelmed with anxiety I was panicking! I felt like I had just been hit by a train & I couldn't pull myself out of it for anything! We were both so scared!!

As much as I want to (for my own reasons of getting it out & coping with it all) I just can't go back to that moment again...just like the waiting period of his first surgery. It's just something that is so unexplainable that there is absolutely no words to describe the feelings & emotions we went through during these hard times. And even if I did try to write it in words it just wouldn't do it any justice & I would erase & rewrite over & over til I gave up. It's just one of those things that unless you have been there, not just with yourself, but with your very own sweet child, you just can't understand & if you don't than be SO grateful that you don't have to & pray that you never will have to!

Around 2pm we got the news that surgery was done, they had just pulled Ryker off of bybass & that Dr. DelNido would be in to talk to us soon. As soon as Dr. DelNido sat down by us & told us the amazing words "surgery went well" I instantly had the best feeling of relief!!

Dr. DelNido said that Ryker handled surgery better than he has with any of his surgeries in the past :) :) He even said "Ryker is doing good!" Now this is coming from Dr. DelNido that never uses the word good, its always "he did okay" So that was GREAT to hear!! He did fix the valve & he said that went well & that the band tightness looks perfect! So all is well with our sweet Ryker & his 4th heart surgery!! Thank you God, for hearing & answering our prayers!!

Going back into Ryker's room after surgery I was absolutely terrified!! Every other time before coming back from either surgery or a cath it is literally shocking to see our sweet baby in the state that he returns in....however, this time around, as much as it was so hard to see him take 10 steps backwards again, he looked REALLY good!!! His skin color was not ghost white, it was a good flush pink tone & looked very "normal" & he didn't look really dehydrated or mangled at all. He did have the expected surgical misc attached all over that is always so very hard to see, but his overall appearance was great! It was such a relief for both Jason & I.

From there we just couldn't wait to get him back on the right track & get this sweet baby extubated & eating again soon!! :)