Eye Surgery for my little girl ...

I was reminded today how rude I was to not tell everyone (well, at least my sister) that our sweet little girl is going in for eye muscle surgery tomorrow morning. I'm not sure how it escaped my mind to blog about it because we can certainly use the prayers. It's a completely routine surgery and it'll be done quickly ... that's not what we're worried about. Kalyssa is being extremely brave as well so we're not worried about that either. (Actually she's excited about it because it means she won't need to wear a patch anymore.) Basically, KC and I are a little bit on the over-protective side. I know! That doesn't sound like us at all! LOL! We've left our kids with a very select few people (mostly family) and nobody other than the two of us have ever driven them anywhere. (Well, my mom and sister did once but I was in the car - half blind and sick as a dog but I was still there.) So the hardest part of this whole ordeal is handing over our baby, whom we waited so long for to begin with, to complete strangers with drugs and very sharp instruments. Don't get me wrong ... we are a very faithful, God loving family and we KNOW He's got this. That brings us a lot of comfort but it's still hard, ya know.

On another level, there is no guarantee that she won't need another surgery. This one has to work absolutely, completely perfectly in order to avoid another one. Who wants to hand over their child once, much less two or three times? I don't know anyone who would raise their hands to that. I certainly don't! And this one surgery is going to cost us more than $3,000. The likelihood of a second surgery taking place prior to our deductible resetting to zero would be a miracle. In this troubled economy, well, you get the picture I'm sure. So I'm going to beg you for prayers that this surgery will be the 100%, absolutely, completely perfect surgery we need it to be. And while you're praying could you please add that Kalyssa not catch this nasty cold that KC and I both have? We sure would appreciate it!

So this is how this whole thing is going down ...

• KC, Kalyssa and I will be leaving this evening after dinner to head to the big city and stay with family. Kaden is being lovingly watched after by Mema (KC's mom - thank you so much Susan!) and I expect they will have a fantastic time together, just the two of them!
• We need to check Kalyssa in to the pediatric out-patient surgery center (we've heard great things about this facility and their staff/anesthesiologists) by 7:45 in the morning. She can't eat or drink anything after midnight tonight.
• There will be lots of sitting around, snuggling, comforting, card games, etc. for approximately 2 hours.
• At 9:45(ish) she'll be taken from us to the OR. They will put her out with gas. They may or may not need to give her an IV. If they do they will take it out before she wakes up. Surgery will be performed on both of her eyes and it's expected to take 15-20 minutes. (Just in case you're wondering, because we did, they will work from the front of her eyes, pulling back her eyelids. It's not nearly as scary as my preinformed brain was making it out to be.) Her surgeon has performed over 6000 of these surgeries and we're very comfortable with him.
• After her surgery she will be taken to recovery where we will be waiting for her. She will not have patches on her eyes (our doctor doesn't do that because it's very scary for the children.) We will be there for about 30 minutes or so while she recovers. (Longer if necessary.) Then we will make the 1 1/2 hour drive home with me sitting in the back holding a barf bucket and Kalyssa's hand and feeding her apple juice and crackers to her little hearts content.
• We expect her to have very red eyes for 2-3 weeks. Her eyelids will be pretty swollen for a couple of days and we'll have to put an ointment in her eyes 3 times a day for a little while. We'll have a follow-up appointment with her doctor in about a week, I think.

So there you go. That's the story and you have all been update. Better late than never, right?

Thanks for the prayers! They are felt and greatly appreciated!!