So happy

In Carly's room I have this picture framed and it sits on her dresser.

She likes to look at it and hold it. She says, "It's me at the doctor when I was a baby." 

Yesterday we were in her room getting ready for school and Carly was talking about the picture.

She said, "I'm holding your finger, Mommy. Mom, you were happy. You were so happy."

Yes, Carly.

I was SO, SO, SO happy!

Vesicoureteral re-implantation surgery

I figured it's probably time to post about Carly's surgery, 1 month after it was done. Surgery was Wednesday, December 7th and it definitely wasn't the in and out in 2 days that we had planned on it being. We had hoped for the laproscopic approach but because of scar tissue from her shunt surgeries in her belly and the distal end of the shunt tubing being in the area the surgeon would be he did not want to risk manipulating her shunt causing malfunction so he chose the standard bikini line incision. 

She was taken to the O.R. around 1:30 and surgery began at 2:04. We thought it would be a 2 hour surgery but it took 3 1/2 hours!!! I started pacing the floors around the 2 hour mark and the following 1 1/2 hours was LONG!!! I finally saw her and we were finally taken to our room. She had a really hard time waking up because of being sedated for such a long time and pretty much slept the first 2 days in the hospital with short spurts of being alert. She started vomiting like crazy the second day which lasted for 2 days. She wouldn't eat which started causing major concerns and was very confused at times. Our best guess is that because of being under for such a long time it kind of put her bowels to sleep. She finally started eating on Monday, December 12th and we were able to go home that evening. So glad that is over and so far things seem to have worked great!!

 Carly's scrub nurse has hydrocephalus too and let Carly touch his shunt. So cool!!

 Being wheeled back to the O.R. I hate saying goodbye to my baby.

 How many nurses does it take to move a 29 lb little girl with a 5 inch incision on her belly?

 Sleeping soundly in her padded bed.

 Yep, had to post it. 

 Brothers finally got to come see her. I look terrible!!

 She woke up enough to color a bit....

then when I went to the bathroom she fell asleep. :)

I have one tough little girl. Every time I think something is too hard and that I can't do it I remember that this little girl has gone through 2 brain surgeries and now bladder surgery. She did not complain about pain and has the same incision I had for my c-section and I complained a TON!! She is my miracle!

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Vesicoureteral re-implantation is the surgical fix for kidney reflux. Carly's Dr cut her bladder in half, tunneled out the ureters, crossed them and then cut and re-implanted them on the opposite side to lengthen the ureters. He sewed her bladder back up then placed steri-strips to close her belly. After surgery a caudal block was placed (basically a child's epidural) to help with pain after her surgery.