Caitlin's Surgery- Day 1

We are sitting now in the waiting room, waiting for Caitlin to get out of surgery. Everything has gone pretty smoothly so far. We got up here about 6:30 last night, had a nice dinner, then checked into the hotel. Unfortunately it took Caitlin a long time to go to sleep, so she got a lot less than her normal 10 hours. We even brought her Pack-n-Play from home so she'd have a familiar bed, but the room, noises, temperature, etc. were all different so she had a hard time sleeping.

This morning we got up at 5:30 to be here by 7. We got checked in, then they took us back to get Caitlin's weight, height, and vitals. Caitlin got upset, even when they were doing things that she hadn't had a problem with the last time we were here (like taking her blood pressure), but she was tired and hungry so I wasn't too surprised! Then they gave me the cutest little baby scrubs to put her in. Too cute!

We talked to several doctors and nurses, then they took us back to another big room with lots of beds. They gave Caitlin some medicine (orally) that was supposed to relax her. She almost immediately put her head down on my chest and started sucking her thumb and we thought the drugs had worked awfully fast, but the anesthesiologists kept saying that they would wait for the drugs to take affect before they took Caitlin away from me (they wouldn't let me take her back to the O.R. myself). I wondered how much more relaxed she'd get...

All of a sudden she looked up at me and laughed (for no reason), then she went completely limp like a wet noodle! Her head flopped back and I'm glad I caught her in time! It was like she was completely drunk. Whatever those drugs were, I'd like some! She was looking around and laughing at nothing (like the wall- she found it highly amusing!), then her eyes would roll back, then she'd start laughing again. It was kind of funny, although we felt really bad laughing at her (or I guess we were really laughing with her)! At one point she looked back up at me, then slowly brought her hand up to my face and kept patting it and just laughing. I'm not sure what was so amusing, but she sure was having fun!

Finally about 8:40 the anesthesiologists came back to take Caitlin back to the O.R., but the one decided to carry her instead of rolling her on the bed. Caitlin was just so cute she couldn't resist holding her! But they still needed the bed so she had the other doctor take the bed. The other anesthesiologist said "Yea, sure- you take the cute kid and I get to roll an empty bed!" Caitlin didn't cry when they took her from me; she was so out of it she didn't have a clue what was going on. That was best; it made it easier for both of us.

Anyway, now we wait (it's almost 10:30 now). We went to get some breakfast, although all I wanted was my Dr. Pepper. I did decide to eat an ice cream sandwich, just to put something in my stomach. It's not the best breakfast, but it's honestly the only thing I could find that I wanted. Then we returned to the waiting room. There is a big TV screen here where we can watch the status of what's going on, but all it's said is "Surgery Started." They said it should take about 3 hours, so I'm not expecting to hear anything before 11:30 or so. We have a pager, and they have my cell phone number so we can walk around the hospital if we want. Eventually the doctors (both the plastic surgeon and the ENT) will come back here to talk to us about how everything went once they are finished. Once Caitlin is in recovery they will call us back to be with her.

The hospital does offer free Wi-fi, so hopefully I'll be able to keep updating as I get the chance. Thank you for all of your prayers and well-wishes. I'll be very, very glad when this is all behind us- not only the surgery, but the 3-week recovery!