Surgery is never fun for anyone, especially when it entails prohibiting a 1 year old from eating or drinking after midnight. Of course, with Alex still not sleeping through the night, he woke up at 1:00am. I decided that I would nurse him anyways and pray he would sleep until we had to leave for the surgery center. No luck! Alex woke up again at 3:00, when I made Sam take over. Luckily Alex knows dad cannot nurse him, so on this rare night, he actually fell back asleep with dad downstairs. That held him over until it was time to leave for the surgery center at 6:15 am. Sam and I were able to keep Alex distracted enough that he didn't ever realize he was hungry. At around 8:00, they gave Alex his "goofy juice" and by 8:20 wheeled him back to surgery. That has got to be the hardest moment for a parent because you are then entrusting the life of your baby to a doctor you are hoping is as skilled and competent as you believe they are.
After about only 10 or 15 minutes, Alex ENT came out and said he was finished and doing fine. I thought he was kidding. It was so quick I barely had time to check my emails and begin a goofy game on my phone while I waited. I was so glad and just wanted to get to my baby boy! A few minutes later, the nurses brought us back to his recovery area. Wow! If that is what h*** is like, I never want to even get close to it!!!! People were moaning and crying out on all sides. The only thing separating Alex from all the other patients recovering was a curtain. I quickly grabbed Alex from a nurse that was holding him, hopped on his bed, and tried to get him to nurse. He was very content. However, I felt so bad for the little one across the walkway from us. He was very upset and crying. I was so glad to be holding my little guy close and to know he felt comforted! When about 10 or 15 minutes had gone by, a nurse walked in and said, "Here is some juice. Will he take a popsicle? I'll bring you one. I'll come right back." She handed me his juice, and a few moments later she came back with an orange popsicle with several paper towels wrapped around it. "Okay, he can go home now!" she told us. I was quite shocked because he still had not even really opened his eyes yet. We wrapped Alex up and carried him to the van. He was very floppy and slept hard until around 12:30pm. I was a little nervous about him being so--- sleepy, but it was kind of nice to have him get some much needed rest! Alex had a little lunch, but wasn't more than 10minutes into it when his head started bobbing and he was dozing off again. I took him out of his chair, cleaned him up, then put him back to bed, where he slept until 6:00pm. When he woke up this time, he was quite a bit more alert and active. We ate dinner as a family, then took Alex to Woodruff Park to feed the ducks and take a walk around the lake. What a great night! We even got to see hundreds of lightning bugs at sunset! It was incredible! He was very happy and we noticed just a few hours after surgery how much clearer his words sounded. We thought he talked good before, but now he is GREAT! The next day, Alex behaved like nothing even happened. It's amazing how quickly kids bounce back!
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