Saturday

My days seem to be running together. Arianna woke up Saturday morning VERY uncomfortable. 

 

 She woke up asking for her bear "Coco" which let me know the anesthesia was finally wearing off and slowly my girl is coming back. Unfortunately, she was my very unhappy little girl...but my girl none the less. I would say today has been all about soothing Arianna and pain management and a continuous process.

She did get to see her older brother, Cyrus, this morning. She was so out of it cause she worked herself up so bad. I have to say today has been the worst day by far.

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 We went back and forth on whether to keep doing the morphine to keep her sedated but the plan was to get her up and walking. However, it was obvious her little body has just been under too much trauma from surgery and the last 24-hrs. Good thing it was at this point Dr. Teodori came to check on her. He looked at her x-rays and fluid output and decided it was time to pull her chest tubes, with the hope it would also bring relief.  This is a HUGE step and scary one. They do conscious sedation so hopefully she won't remember it but we will. I sat there with her awake talking to me about what they were doing. She asked Dr. Teodori if it would hurt and he told her yes. Even though they say your child will not remember it you are sitting there carrying on this converstaion with them about how scared they are and what they are doing. I guess only time will tell if she really remembers. 

Chest tubes out!

When she got up to use the potty we decided to let me hold her to get things moving with her recovery. Sitting up, walking, coughing all these things help the lungs. Right now she does have a left pleural effusions which is the same lung she has always had trouble with and gave her a hard time after her first surgery. Last time a few days after pulling the chest tubes she had to have another put back in. Since this is a different surgery Dr T is hoepful this will not happen this time around. We just have to focus on all the things I listed above...which we started with me holding her.

She has been fiighting me about wearing the cannula so we did a little "blow-bye" to calm her down. After we got situated  and feand my sister was there to talk with she just listened to my voice and feel asleep. I was able to hold her for a long time and then put her in bed to sleep some more.

After all that rest it was time to do another big girl thing and go for a walk. Since our nurse was on lunch during the chest tube removal we had the pleausre of having nurse Jamie assist. I also took that time to talk with her about how to move forward in Arianna's recovery, specifically the walking. She told me she knows how hard it is to see and hear them saying "ouch" and crying but we have to get them moving. So once my mom got here tonight we did just that. She went for a walk OUT of her room and to the unit clerks desk and back. It was so sad and yet I was so happy because this was my girl giving her all to get better. She is incredibly brave little girl and I am so honored to be her mother!

I cannot begin to tell you how much that walk did for her. She came back and felt better. She started talking and coughing. She stayed awake the longest since surgery and even opened a few cards and presents. I put in a movie she opened as she went in and out of it. She even wrote her name on her doodle pad from Miss Christina! She blew me away!!!

Now the next picture I will have to frame because this was when I saw my little girl smile for the first time after surgery. As I said she is slowly coming around more and more since we are weaning from morphine, just using for when she has to get up.

I am so thankful for my mom staying with me tonight. Robert needed to have a night with Devin. I was able to sleep for about an hour then Arianna needed up to go potty and then took a long time to get comfortable, which my mom was able to do! :) I'm actually going to try and get some rest while I can. I will update again tomorrow. Praying for an even better day!