From NICU to PICU

So of course Jordan had his surgery Tuesday. There was actually a mix up on Monday that almost cause the thing to be postponed again. The hospital always confirms the day of the surgery, but never confirms the time until the day before the surgery. The call the evening before to tell you what time to show up and of course I stepped out of the house right when they called. They left a message to return the call, but I didn't get the message until after business hours. Anyway, we know that they do surgeries in order of age with the youngest first so Jordan was likely to be first or second. To get to Jacksonville first we woke up the baby around 5 am. There's no problem with the parents getting up first, but we had to wake up Jordan, dress him, give him some foul tasting medicine, and load him in the car before sunrise. All of this without eating or drinking anything except medicine. He got is revenge in the hospital the way that only my son would. He didn't fuss much, he just started running away after he was wearing his little gown. He was adorable and all, but mama and I had to take turns chasing him down while the other answered question for the nurses. The other parents thought he was too cute. I thought he was too quick.

The surgery was to laser out some of the fluid filled cysts in his throat. All of them together created a kind of whistle which gave Jordan a virtually constant wheeze. The doctor told us it would take about an hour and a half to fix it and as she promised we saw her almost right on time. The procedure went perfect and the kid was in recovery. They have this policy where they don't let the parents into the first recovery area so we had to wait another 20 minutes or so until they moved him to his room in the pediatric intensive care unit (PICU). They told us before time that Jordan no matter how this went was going to spend a night in the hospital for observation. The PICU took up most of the 3rd floor of the hospital and I was secretly happy to see that at least half the rooms were empty. If you ask me, children's hospitals should be fully funded but completely empty of patients. My old NICU manners didn't let me stare into the occupied rooms, but I did notice that all the other ones I saw must have been older than Jordan because no one else was in a crib. Jordan was in a weird metal crib whose sides must have been a little over 2 feet high because they went up to his neck when standing. Of course at the time he was sitting with an IV in his left hand (we should have told them he was left handed) and a bunch of leads. He was also pretty punch drunk because he was reclining (he never reclines while he's awake). The TV was turned to Sesame Street so he made no serious attempt to acknowledge his parents or the two nurses attending to him. He was in some sort of nitrous/elmo haze so we let him be. We saw the familiar monitor keeping track of all the vitals and smelled the familiar smell, and I felt nothing. He was satting about 97%. His heart rate was good. After my experience with that machine, I felt absolutely no fear at all. The entire time when the alarms went off, I knew if was because the machine was wrong.

Jordan has certain rules at home that we try to follow. He doesn't get a pacifier any more. We try to limit him to an hour of TV (though we strongly suspect his grandparents don't). He doesn't use a sippy cup anymore. If you want an object you either name it, sign it, or point it. You eat in the chair and try to feed yourself. All of those rules were suspended in the hospital. He got all the TV he wanted, drank from a sippy cup, and spent most of the day with a pacifier in his mouth. And he still spent half the day fussing. We think he had gas, but what ever it was he was cranky. He spent the first 6 hours either crying, watching TV, or both. Of course 2 year olds don't just cry either. For him, crying is a full contact sport that involves climbing out of the crib, pulling at leads, and climbing on any adult within arms reach. When he gets a tantrum, I get out of breath. He didn't really calm down until dinner came.

Jordan is usually a picky eater, but that hospital food must have had something special in it. He ate Jello (which we thought he hated). He ate mashed potatoes and gravy and corn (he hates corn at home). He did chicken his own special way. That means grabbing the drumstick, putting the narrow end in the mouth, removing the skin and cartilage and sucking on the bone – under no circumstances eating any meat. Even Mima and Pop pop were amazed at how much he ate when they showed up around dinner time. He ate so much that he took a nap at 6pm (something else he isn't allowed to do at home because of his 8pm bedtime). By the time he woke up we let him has a disney movie for the first time. We have nothing against disney, but at home we limit him to the educational stuff. Madagascar may be funny to big kids, but it's nothing more than pretty pictures to a two year old. By the time he finally got to sleep, we headed to the cafeteria to get something for us to eat.

The next morning we noticed we couldn't hear Jordan breathing. His number were fine, but we just couldn't hear him. In the past, if you couldn't hear Jordan breathe in a quiet room, he wasn't in it. When the doctor came in to listen to him breathe, she confirmed what I thought. The stridor is gone. She told us to come back in a month for a regular visit to see how the scars are healing, but for now we could go home. We were out of the hospital within an hour of the doctor writing the order.