The Little Men and a Princess: Matching Scars

Sweet little John had to have his surgery for his hernia. We were praying and hoping the Lord would heal him and he wouldn't have to have the surgery. But, that was not His plan.

I certainly had the peace of the Lord the day of the surgery. I'm generally a bit of a worrier. We had to be at St. Louis Children's Hospital at 5:45am. (Yikes!) I was up multiple times in the night waking John up to feed him and give him Pedialyte while he could have it.

Greg, John, and I got in the car at 5:00am to head to the hospital. (When we were determining departure time, I failed to realize there would be no traffic at that hour... We were a tad bit early. Just long enough to change a poopy diaper.)

When we got to the surgery waiting area, there was a little cube with a sofa and some chairs with our name on it. It was nice to have our own little space.

He has no idea what's coming

By the time they called us back, John had fallen asleep in my arms. (Afterall, I kept waking the poor boy up!) I laid him down on the scales, they took his blood pressure, heart rate, etc. and he slept through it all. It was a little shocking really. He was tired! Everyone who came in during the prep said he was pretty big for a 3 month old. (Turns out 90th percentile...)

John's hippo got to go into the OR with him. (I slept with it the night before so it would smell like me.) They put a little hospital band on his neck so he wouldn't get lost.

When the time came to turn our sweet little baby over, they let us carry him down the hall. Then we had to hand him off. By this time, he was starting to get hungry and a little fussy. I wish I would have taken a picture of him as they carried him away. (I had other things on my mind.) I could see his sweet little face over the nurses shoulder as they took him. It was so sweet.

Once we got back to our little cube, I asked Greg if he could go down and find me a coffee. I was expecting him to find something in the building, but he came back wet and with Starbucks. (It was pouring!) It was so sweet.

The surgery took about an hour. I was never anxious, until Dr. Dillon, our surgeon, came around the corner. For a split second, I was very fearful. But the first thing out of his mouth was, "Everything went well." Those were sweet words! He said John was just starting to wake up and they'd call us back in just a few minutes to see him.

He was very out of sort when we got to him. Starving, tired, disoriented... He sort of nursed, but mostly slept. I carried him from recovery to our room. (He was admitted because of his young age.) He nursed and slept in my arms for several hours.