Surgery #2

You know those "pinch me if this is real" moments? I have been having that all morning. Rewind to yesterday. I was a ball of nerves before the surgery. I mean this was THE surgery that was going to make everything better and I was so anxious to see if it worked. Dr. McClay made a small incision in his neck and removed the stint from the first surgery. He had three small scar tissue growths that he got rid of. The whole thing took only about and hour and when he came into the consultation room he said everything looked "picture perfect and was nice and OPEN" Talk about huge relief. It is absolutely amazing! I wish I could show you a good pic of the inside of his airway you would never be able to tell that he grafted two different pieces of rib cartilage in there it was literally seamless. The body is so incredible!

 Little man was not too happy with my when we walked back into children's. Boston let him wear his owl beanie for good luck and I think Carter was pretty happy about it. He wore it the whole time. Surgery included. Pretty cute. 

 Thanks to a dose of silly juice he went from angry to super crazy. About five minutes after this pic he zonked out in my arms. 

 He was super loopy after anesthesia this time. Not only is he usually loopy from the anesthesia, but he had an allergic reaction to badadine a topical ointment for his incision so he got a heavy dose of benadryl. As far as his sats he bounced right back like usual and we were able to head home about and hour after surgery. I guess after your 11th time they aren't too worried how you will react to all the meds. Ha.

This morning has been the "pinch if this is real" moment. When I went in his room to get him this morning he was sitting up in his bed with no trach in. Usually when he pulls his trach out his neck is super red from itching (he has really bad eczema around his neck and that is usually why he takes his trach out) but this morning his neck wasn't red at all so I'm guessing it was out for a while. I put my hand over his neck and mouth and was shocked to find him breathing out his mouth. I put his trach back in went out and decided to try capping off his trach to see how he would do. When I put it on he acted as if nothing happened. He was breathing with absolutely no difficulty! I started bawling my eyes out! It is the first time that I have really believed that we might actually be able to get rid of his trach. I have always talked about it, but never really allowed myself to believe that it would actually happen. It just seems too good to be true. Not only was that amazing, but he decided that he would happily walk around the house with his little push toy. He normally hates that thing. He also pulled himself up to standing with no help and he ate and swallowed a pretzel. I am sure not all of these milestones were a result of the surgery, but to have them all happen on the same day was the best thing ever!

To make things even better I HEARD him say DADA!!!! Life is good so so good!