The Glenn, continued

Post op hasn't been fun for any of us, especially Wyatt. The thing about the Glenn is that they remove the sano shunt (or BT shunt, depending on your surgeons decision at the time of the Norwood) and replace it with the Bi-Directional Glenn shunt. When Wyatt had the sano shunt, his blood didn't have much of a choice as to where it went. The sano shunt told it what to do. Now that he has the Glenn shunt, blood can go two different directions. Now, we want the blood to go to his head and upper limbs and passively flow to his lungs. But since the blood can take this new path- it does- and it gets stuck, so to speak. This leaves Wyatt's head and upper body full of blood that isn't super oxygenated, leaving him swollen, blue, and with one hell of a headache. His intensivist described it to us as if we were to lay upside down and let the blood pool in our heads. You know how your head starts to hurt after about 30 seconds of that? Wyatt's blood has even doing that for 2 days. Can you imagine how he feels?!

So, Wyatt's head hurts. A lot. More than a lot. And his chest hurts. Because they cut it open, opened up his rib cage, and dug around in there for a few hours before sewing everything back up. His left foot, both wrists, and neck hurt from his IV's. His tummy hurts- were giving him pretty heavy duty pain killers, which causes constipation, and his intestines didn't do much for a day or so during surgery. The poor kid needs a good poop. His right side hurts, from where they cut a slit and inserted a tube for blood drainage. I hear those chest tubes hurt like hell. His throat hurts, from being intubated. His lungs hurt, from being intubated. This makes him cough, which in turn hurts his chest and his throat. So, yeah, it's safe to say he is in a lot of pain.

His doctors and nurses are great about pain management. I saw on the computer today they rated his pain a 7/10. He is receiving Tylenol with a narcotic in it every 4 hours. He also has orders for dilaudid every 2 hours. They also gave him a dose of Ativan today to help calm him down. That's like popping a Xanax. And still, he can't get comfortable.

He has started eating, thankfully. And his labs and numbers look pretty good. They ran a CBC this morning (complete blood count) and that came back a little low so he got FFP (fresh frozen plasma). His O2 sats are good- unless he's crying. It is to be expected that he will drastically de-sat when crying, until his body gets used to its new plumbing. He is on a lot of oxygen. 100% O2 at 2 liters of flow. He may have to come home on oxygen for a few weeks, we don't know yet. His head is about twice it's normal size. His face, eyes, and neck are very swollen. This is expected to go away. But, he isn't requiring much in the way of meds. At two days post Norwood, he was still on 4 or 5 meds to help his heart function. At two days post Glenn, he is on none. They turned his Milrinone off today, and he was only on epinephrine for a short time. This time around he never got dopamine, and they haven't started any Enalapril. He is getting some calcium and potassium to make up for post op deficiencies. He is getting heparin to thin his blood. Colace to help him poo. Obviously the pain meds. Prevacid for his acid reflux. Lasix to get the extra fluid off. And that's about it.

From a medical standpoint, he is doing very very well. From a mommy standpoint, he is suffering, and I hate it. No parent should have to see their child endure this- multiple times. No parent should be put in the position where they either force their child through this, or he dies. Yes, it is really that cut and dry. Without these surgeries, Wyatt would have died just days after birth.

This time around, I am better about controlling my emotions. I definitely bawled while holding Wyatt just before surgery. But I have been good about keeping my composure, especially in front of Austyn. So that has been good. We will see how I do going forward.

I just hope that Wyatt can find some comfort soon. Then we can move on to weaning his oxygen, and coming back home, where he belongs. We were home for almost 4 months before his Glenn, and I loved it. Two days post op and I am so very ready for our life back, not life in the hospital.

As things progress, you know I'll be here updating.

Until then, be well!