Surgery day

Surgery day was long, if it wasn't for her it for sure was for me.  We woke her up at 6:00 am to feed her and gave her some ativan.   True to herself she fought it for five hours before caving in to a nap on the ride to the hospital.  This sedation was a little different than the others, usually we get to carry her into the sedation room and they give some sleep meds in her iv while we're holding her and she pretty well nods off before we're gone and then they come get us before she wakes up so we can be there.  Not in the OR, they gave her some meds to try to calm her, but we couldn't carry her into the room so we had to let total strangers take her from our arms as she screamed "dada" and we walked away from her.  Yep, it was awful.  Hope I never have to do it again. 

Good news is she made it through the surgery with no complications and her PICC line is finally gone and her port in place.  If a picture can prove anything, this one proves we have a Daddy's girl.  The nurse automatically assumed after surgery Gracie would want Mom...until she immediately reached for her Daddy.  Which I have accepted as a blessing with my pregnant body at this point, and especially since this is the first visit (other than hospital stays) that Todd has been able to go to due to rotations.  She has her order of people and luckily if number one is not present she will usually accept number two as number one!

1. Dad

2. Mom

3. Grandma... you get the picture

After we got out of the OR we hurried upstairs for the rest of her treatment for the day.  Which was luckily just a blood draw and some IV chemo (VC) which is only about a 5 min drip.  Then we picked up our new meds from the pharmacy and headed home.  We have learned to always pick up her new meds at the hospital pharmacy because every time I haven't I find out that no other pharmacy carries drugs for pediatric cancer patients.  Just a  handy tip in case any of you ever wanted to know not to get oxycodone in an infant dose at a regular pharmacy (unless you want to wait 4 days). 

Here she is a with her fancy bandaids a couple days after surgery.  Believe it or not she hasn't ripped them off yet. 

And there it is close up, her new port.  I am a little nervous for Tuesday to see how she reacts to the new process of having it accessed.  Of course I myself wouldn't be thrilled to see someone coming at me with a needle each week.  I'm hoping she will adjust a little better to clinic now that she's off the steroids and not having surgery.  Last time she was so hysterical they couldn't get her blood pressure until she was sedated, when they tried her arm turned purple.  What do we take from this...she's a fighter!  So despite the stress I feel watching her so upset each week, nothings going to keep her from fighting and winning this battle.  You're still my little hero.