February 2011

February brought Cooper's heart surgery on Greg's 26th birthday. The hardest part of the day was Cooper was wheeling him down to the OR and handing him over to the anesthesiologist. We cried and cried like we never before. Waiting in the OR waiting room was pure torture. Every time the update phone would ring I would jump up and run over. We got several updates and finally got to speak with Dr. Burch, Cooper's surgeon. He told us when we met with him before the surgery that he would be very honest with us about how he felt things went, so when he told us that he was pleased with how things went I was ecstatic. Then we got to go see him in the CICU and that was when Greg broke down the hardest. Seeing him attached to more wires and machines than we had ever seen was almost too much to bare. The nursing staff in the CICU were amazing and assured us that he was going to do great.

The next several days were really hard between seeing him in pain, trying to extubate, and having hospital staff rush into the room to force breaths into him because he would forget to breath. We loved the nurses in the CICU. Michelle and Judy were are favorites. Michelle called Cooper Tarzan, because she thought he was so strong and big. Judy would play soothing Beatles lullaby CDs for him all night and share her candy with us. The Friday after his surgery he was moved to the floor to prepare to go home. He kept getting wires and tubes removed one by one and I could hold him all day! He was originally supposed to go home on February 14th, but ended up having feeding issues with aspirating and had to stay a few more days. We brought him home on February 17th and it was such an overwhelmingly amazing day. We were scared to death, but so thrilled to have him at home.

He cried a lot and I thought every time he did that something was wrong, but he was colic-y and was only happy being held in my arms. He would cry for hours at night, we tried everything to soothe him. Finally he would fall asleep around midnight. He did good at sleeping through the night unless his binky fell out. He was not allowed to drink anything until he passed his swallow study. The binky became our life saver! Three weeks later he had another swallow study and he was still aspirating on thin liquids, but not thick. We were able to gradually start giving him nectar thick milk. We had a love-hate relationship with the feeding tube and pump. We became experts at priming that pump and pumping his meds through. Until we clogged it with aspirin and had to go in the middle of a snow storm to get his tube pulled and replaced. No one told us not to pump aspirin in his tube!

This is him just hours after surgery.

One day after surgery.

Two days after surgery. 

Five days after surgery and on the floor.

The day he was going to go home a wireless baby, but decided he need the feeding tube just a little longer. 

Day we got to go home!

One day home and just got back from his first visit to his pediatrician. 

He had to wear socks on his hands because if not he was constantly trying to pull his tube out. 

February was really rough, but so much better having our boy home and on the road to recovery than driving to the hospital everyday to leave without him.