Amazing Days!

 I have been wanting to write this post for a week now but seem to have been faced with so many things that stopped me from doing so. Important, urgent things like my dad having a heart attack and finding out that he will be having bypass surgery in the next couple of weeks. But, things have settled  down a bit at the moment and I so want to share here the news of Emma's six week check!
Emma and I headed down to Children's last week to see her surgeon for her first post op appointment. I was looking forward to seeing (on the inside) how things were healing for Emma. There was a long wait today to get through the normal wait, xray, wait, wait in a different room, and then to see the Dr. Emma and I were laughing a lot and making funny jokes. Our family is known to remember and repeat funny lines from shows, you tube, etc. and we kept finding things to say them to while we were waiting. When Emma's Dr.came in he said, "I heard you two were getting pretty rowdy in here!" So funny! That just made us laugh more. He was totally joking but that made it funnier.
Anyhow, he chatted with Emma about how she has been feeling, examined her and discussed that she should just keep to walking for now and not to add any other activities yet. He also decided to send her for Phsyio to help loosen her shoulder and neck muscles. He is happy so far with how everything looks.
I was curious, as were some of our friends who have asked me, where exactly do they put the bone that they hope will fuse her spine together. So I asked him. I think he misunderstood what I was asking about because he brought up an xray that they took while Emma was still in surgery. It had to do with the top 87 degree curve and where they removed that whole vertebral column. They actually did remove that whole thing. probably 3 or 4 verteba worth leaving only her spinal chord during they surgery. The xray he showed us was during that time and showed two small temporary rods that held her spine in that area until he was able to build the bone back in around her spinal chord. Crazy! He told us that usally during surgery, there is musc playing, people are chatting a bit etc. but they have a special code when everything has to be completely quiet except for communication about the surgery. Emma was one of those times. After telling us this, he leaned back in his chair and let out a sigh and said, " I don't know what you were all doing on a spiritual level but, it worked." He told us again how it was amazing how she didn't have any bleeding while they were doing all that bone cutting. The anisthetist (sp) even asked during the surgery. "Are you expecting to loose any blood?" They were, but it never happened! Emma's Dr. relayed to us how even Emma's recovery was remarkable. The staff at the hospital couldn't believe how little pain she had after all that he had done and even asked the Dr. if he had her mixed up with another patient. He also said, "I can tell you this now that the surgery is over but for 4 or so days leading up to Emma's surgery, I was sweating." He said how he knew that there was a huge element of trust for us to hand over our child to him for him to batter them in the OR for 10 hours.   ( He had been worried about the surgery but little did he know that we have a great God who was taking care of all the details) I repsponded with something lame and he said, "It's good, it keeps me humble." I told him how for us, we were not worried. That we trusted him (and God) and that we were atually quite peaceful leading up to the surgery. Even up until that day. He told us that he thought we were really casual and relaxed the morning of the surgery and he found that to be a little weird for him at the time.

"Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God , which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus." Phil. 4:7

Anyhow, Emma is doing remarkably well and will see her Dr. in another six weeks. We share this with you because we want to bring Glory to God, to share with you how God has answered your and our prayers, to encourage you that God still moves in remarkable ways. It is so easy to get bogged down with all the trials of life but I know that I and our family will be able to look back on these days and remember that God sees us and hears our prayers and is quietly orchestrating all things for our good and His glory even in the body of a young girl, using the hands of a gifted surgeon who knew and could see that God's hands were guiding his hands and all the events around this surgery. Praise the Lord!

Day 8 and 9

Well, I think we've turned a corner. Emma is no longer on the antibiotics and her tummy troubles have subsided some. This is a huge relief! She slept half of each of the last 2 nights in her own bed. She seems to wake up in the middle of the night to take some meds and move to the couch in the living room to give her body a break and assume a new position. She had been slightly tilted to one side due to all the short muscles in her body that were shortened because of her curve and those are very slowly stretching out and she is slowing looking a bit straighter each day.
She was able to take a bath of sorts today and this helps to feel so much better. Tomorrow I will wash her hair again. Also, I made her get up and go outside for a walk down to the "round about" and back this evening. I think this did her a world of good. Tomorrow she will walk there again in the morning with her dad while I take the other kiddos to church. (The treck to Vancouver and back is still a bit much for her.)
Thank you so much to everyone who has visited Emma, brought her some goodies, brought our family a meal while I was with Emma in hospital, or since we've been home (I've been so tired so this has been a blessing to me. ), sent encouraging words, prayed, and cared for our family. We have been blessed.

Day 6 and 7

Well, we are home and being home has had it's ups and downs for Emma. I can tell that generally she is happier here and that she clearly missed her sibs as much as they missed her. She was thrilled last night to have a home cooked meal and she laughed out loud at something her brother said that frankly wasn't really all that funny but the two of them are so close they are a little lost without each other.

The last two plus days at the hospital Emma has been having tummy troubles. She is having to get up to the bathroom with tummy cramps very often. Last night she was up at least 12 times. As you can imagine, this is quite upsetting to her and disturbs her sleep so much so that she (nor I ) got very much of it. I had mentioned this issue again yesterday to the ortho nurse and she said to call her back today if there was no change. So, I called her this morning. We decided hesitantly that we would take her off the anitbiotics for now until her surgeon is in tomorrow to see if that helps at all. Hopefully this will give her some relief.
The reason that the nurse(and I ) were both hesitant to stop the antibiotics is because Emma has some irritation near the top of her incision and they usually aggressivly treat anything like that to prevent deeper infection. They did ALOT of bone cutting and don't want a bone infection!

So, if anyone is still reading this, please pray that Emma does not develop any infection, that her tummy trouble will ease off as this will make her much more comfortable. Thank you so much!
Blessings,
Corinna

Day 5 and Diaper Hair :)

So, when I made today's post I forgot a few details. Part of the reason I write this blog is so that Emma will have these memories of this time and that she will see God's love and care for her and how he has so faithfully answered our prayers.

Today we asked Emma's nurse if whe could have her hair washed. She agreed and said that she would come back later to do it. When she came back Emma's friend "Cupcake Shorts" had come to visit but we went ahead with the hairwash anyways. So, the way we thought it would take place is on a tray that is fairly flat and Emma stays lying down on her back for the hair wash but when the nurse came in with the supplies she had a huge package of adult diapers plus (yes, I did say adult diapers!) all the regular hair washing stuff. She proceeded to put some of them under Emma's head since she couldn't find the tray and washed her hair over adult diapers....it's pretty remarkable how much liquid those can hold! Anyway, diaper head....I mean Emma has nice clean hair now and Cupcake Shorts, Emma, her mom and I had a few good laughs about the whole thing. She also got her hair trimmed today since they had spa day here at the hospital!

On a more serious note: The top of Emma's incision is not looking so hot right now. Earlier today they had taken out her IV's and were preparing her for tomorrow's departure but tonight the Dr's wanted her IV reinserted and they put her back on IV antibiotics. They will come and assess it again tomorrow morning. There is a chance that we will not be going home tomorrow....she's pretty upset about that. Please pray that it will get better. Thanks so much!

Day 5

I think we've turned a corner. Emma is feeling much better today! Her fever has been down all day, she got her hair washed and is wearing her own clothes! Today is spa day here so she will also get her hair trimmed later too! ( I might even get my nails done at the same time. We should be coming home tomorrow if everything stays as is.

Day 4

Emma is much more comfortable today. She was given a muscle relaxer last night and that helped with the muscle pain. She is back on morphine. She has been pretty sleepy from the
meds and has been struggling with a fever all day. She did however take a fairly long walk with physio around the halls here even stopping for a free Blizzard! There are a few perks to being in the hospital. She likely won't come home tomorrow since the fever is still on board and they have yet to determine the cause of it. Anyhow, please pray for the fever to subside but more importantly for the reason she has the fever to go away. Also, for her extreme muscle pain. Thanks so much!
<3

Day 3

Well, here we sit 3 days out from Emma's surgery. In some ways the time goes really fast and in other ways it goes so slow.

Today Emma was removed from her mophine IV which she was aiming for because she really wanted to get rid of some of her tubes. Especially the catheter. So, at about 6:30 this morning they took her off after gradually weaning her over the day before. As it turns out the this may have been a tad too early because she has struggled with pain management today. She has been up to go to the bathroom a few times today but can't get comfortable when she gets back to bed. Her muscles are SO sore!

In the early afternoon a orthopeadic Dr. who was on today but also saw Emma yesterday came to see her so we discussed her pain issues. He ordered some more meds for her and some muscle relaxants to help with the muscle spasms. He said that it may take a day or two to turn the corner. He said, that this was not a regular scoliosis surgery. He said it was like that times 5! ( I didn't even know that!) They did ALOT of work in there. The muscle pain is to be expected too because they have taken her very crooked spine and made it pretty straight.

She is well medicated now and is much more comfortable. Stay tuned for day 4.
Blessings