Benjamin's Upcoming Surgery

Here's to the first post in 2008! We'll just dive right in...

We had a pre-op appointment with Benjamin's surgeon yesterday. Benjamin was the last appointment of the day which turned out to be good since I was in there with him for over an hour. Dr. Cortez, the urologist, reviewed Benjamin's chart and then discussed the upcoming surgery. At first, he was reiterating things we had talked about previously, mainly that he is planning to close 2 of Benjamin's stomas on his tummy, reconnect the ureters to the bladder and then bring down Benjamin's undescended testicles. Then he threw me for a loop as he mentioned that he would like to have the option to do some additional work if everything is going smoothly. Essentially, he wants to close the third hole on Benjamin's tummy and then do an abdominoplasty to pull together Benjamin's abdominal muscles. His reasoning is that if everything has proceeded smoothly with few complications and he does not anticipate needing to go in to the abdomen again, then he would like to do the additional work now rather than having another surgery later to do the abdominoplasty. This would save Benjamin a surgery in the future, but would definitely lengthen the current surgery and the recovery time. Without the additional items, the surgery will be 6-8 hours with 3-5 days in the hospital. If he is able to proceed further, then the surgery would likely be 8-10 hours and 5-10 days in the hospital. Whew! That is a big difference. Benjamin was only in the hospital for 11 days when he was born, so it seems like a really long time. Dr. Cortez offered to call Sean on Saturday to discuss things since Sean was home watching the other kids. I thought it was great that he offered to call and answer any other questions we might have run across. I'm a little pessimistic that he will be able to do the additional items, but if he does, it would be a whole new world for Benjamin. No more funky diapering with size 7 diapers and huge pads. We wouldn't have to worry so much about leaks and wet clothes. He could go in a swimming pool or even the ocean. Eventually, this is the plan, but we weren't anticipating it would be so soon. No matter what, Monday will be a very long day! Please keep Benjamin in your thoughts and prayers. He is the light of our lives and an amazing little boy. As Dr. Cortez stated during the appointment, "That's a little miracle boy standing right there!"

My parents are coming in town on Saturday and plan to stay for 2 weeks. Depending on Benjamin's recovery, they may try to sneak down to the Valley to see my mom's parents for a few days. It seems that scheduling a 2 week trip was very insightful considering the new info from yesterday's appointment.

Alex and Emma started back to school this week. I think they were happy to see their friends and definitely jumped right back into work. They both had homework the first day back. Meanwhile, Alex actually stayed home today. At 2:45 this morning, Emma came racing to our room to tell us that Alex was throwing up. Ah, the joys of parenthood. He proceeded to throw up every half hour almost on the dot until 4:15 a.m. Then we finally all got a little sleep. He was a little gray most of the day, but still refused to take a nap. He tried for about 1 minute and said he wasn't tired. He read his books, watched movies, played Webkinz and made a good dent in finishing his science fair project. That was a little blessing so he won't have much left to do.

Before the kids went back to school, I had their pictures taken. The one at the beginning of the post is from the session. Here are a few other cute ones. It's a little difficult to get all three to sit and smile at the same time, but we managed to get a few good ones...Enjoy...