Monday, January 12, 2009

Good News!!!

So, it appears that we may be able to "dodge" surgery after all! Hooray! The surgeon we saw today was really nice and very understanding. Maryam LOVED him. She took to him in a way I haven't seen in 6 months or more. She wanted to shake his hand, she touched his knees, she let him play with her abdomen and her button. She completely trusted him. I should have had him try feeding her! ;)
He said that the button is close to the rib, and yes its uncomfortable and may even be hitting a nerve that runs along the rib bone. But he also said that since its mostly positional that we may be able to make adjustments that will help, leaving surgery as a last option. He ordered an upper GI dye test to make sure that the fundo hasn't popped or there aren't any leaks in her tummy anywhere. He wants us to put extra padding in her bed, since she likes sleeping on her tummy and try binding the button down with gauze or bandages so it can't move. He wants us to keep a pain diary. Note what foods she swallows because new foods may be upsetting her tummy. He wants us to note when she's guarding more, like just after getting off of furniture or waking up. He wants us to note when she wakes up in pain and how long it takes her to get back to sleep. Then, after we've done all that, he wants to see her again in 3 weeks. He'll go over the results of the dye test and we'll go over the diary and changes we've made. At that point we'll decide together if we still want to go ahead with the surgery.
Once he described what the surgery would involve both Brett and I started asking a million questions about alternatives. The surgery is way more invasive than either of us thought, and neither of us can figure out why we thought this time around would be so different. He said that her hospital stay would be a minimum of 3 days and probably closer to a week. He said he'd try doing it laproscopic but with the amount of scar tissue that is inside, he would probably have to open her up again. And he said he'd have to work through all of the scar tissue, probably have to detach the liver from the stomach which typically grows together by scar tissue after the fundoplication, then stretch the stomach, create the new hole then sew up the last one. He said he'd only be moving the button about a half of an inch. When I heard all of that I got really bummed. I don't know why I thought it would be less invasive, probably because this time around there wouldn't be a fundoplication? I don't know.
But anyway, we're hopeful that the new plan will help. We want to do everything in our power to avoid our daughter's fourth surgery. Thank you everyone for sending out "good juju", happy thoughts and prayers! We definitely draw off of it all.

No comments: