Sharing Good News
We are delighted to share some wonderful news: we are home! A week ago our daughter, Elizabeth, had open-heart surgery to repair a serious structural defect (see previous posts for the background and immediate post-surgery update). The estimated recovery time was 5-10 days, and after just 5 days she had met all the markers to come home.
The days following surgery involved a number of tests, and while there are a few areas the team will be monitoring over the coming months, the short version is she is doing not only better than expected, but as well as anyone following this procedure.
Elizabeth holding a saline flush during her time in the ICU. While her parents panicked a bit when we saw it, the nurse reassured us it was a way to help her stay calm during the many procedures and tests - and it seemed to work!
When Mary Erin and I saw her right after the surgery, she was on a dozen IV pumps, a ventilator/breathing tube, a wound vac, and half-a-dozen other medical devices. It took several days in the ICU to wean her off all the support, but each day the team had a plan ("Today we work to get her off the ventilator and Nitric Oxide!") and it progressed with very few complications. She is now back to her pre-surgery norm. While she recovers at home, she is still receiving her breastmilk by g-tube, and she is still on oxygen - but the oxygen is there simply to function as a vasodilator in lieu of adding a new medication.
She will still need several medications over the next weeks / months as her body gets used to the different blood flow patterns of a properly working heart, and there will be lots of follow up appointments and at-home things to make sure she continues to recover well and safely. One of these safety measures is a requirement to avoid large crowds for several weeks until we get clearance from the team - for our church family this means you won't see her for a while until we know her immune system is ready to meet lots of folks. Thanks for your understanding!
Elizabeth gives mamma a HUGE smile on discharge day.
We have already started to see improvements, one of the most striking is her smile. While Elizabeth has always had a beautiful smile, we didn't see it often before the surgery. Now, we see it LOTS - and it is a joy. We can't wait for her to be further along the recovery road so you can see it in person, but here's a photo from our discharge day to give you a taste!
As always, thanks for reading and showing us love and support.