Pre-Operative Appointment

Today we arrived at the hospital at 9:30 am to meet with the Child Life Specialist so she could show Abby a video about what her hospital experience would be like.  She also showed her some of the things that the doctors will be using such as the mask to administer anesthesia, a syringe for medicine and a doll that she could draw on.  She also gave us a tour and showed her where she would  be be staying and took us to the various playrooms.

Once we were done with that, we met with the Surgeons Physicians Assistant who took her medical history, explained the procedure again and answered any questions as well as giving her an exam.  She spent most of the time sitting on the examining table listening to my ipod which I had loaded with Princess music and a few songs that Logan likes.  So as we were talking, she suddenly turns it up and we could hear Dynamite playing - she starts bopping and soon so did the PA and the two of them were having a great time with it!  At the end he asked her if she had any questions and she said "why do you want to keep my pee in that cup".

She also had to have an echo done, an EKG, have blood drawn and an x-ray.  We didn't want her leaving today with a bad ending so before the xray we headed to the lab to have blood drawn.  I'm definately very quesy when it comes to stuff like that, but I held her on my lap while he drew vial after vial of blood and she cried and cried and cried.  When we were done she turned white as a ghost for a little bit so I carried her to xray and she fell asleep for about 30 minutes.  Once we went into xray she woke up and was back to her usual self, did the xray and we went back to the hotel so she could finally go swimming.

We spent a really nice night swimming, had dinner at her favorite place - Noodles and came back to the hotel to give her a bath and let her play with her new present from us - a DSi.

We have to be back at the hospital at 6am and surgery is at 7:30 and should take about 4 hours.  I keep thinking that in 12 hours it will be half way done.

It's kind of been a roller coaster ride, it was devastating when we first found out and then as we talked to people here and other parents and we came to accept it and realized it was for the best and it would make her stronger.  We also knew it could be a whole lot worse.

Tonight, on the other hand, at least for myself, has been really hard.  While I have complete faith in their medical abilities, seeing her so upset at having blood drawn is haunting me - I keep thinking about what it will be like in the morning when they take her into the operating room and how she will be when she comes out.  My biggest fear is that she will be scared or in pain and as many times as I'm told that she won't be, the fear of the unknown is very scary. 

Please say a special prayer for her tonight!