Surgery Day Part 2 - Congenital Cataract

When I first saw M she had the pink shield over her eye just to protect it from being hit or touched by her.  She was hooked up to an IV, and in her little hospital gown.  I held her and cried.  The tears just streamed out of me while I was holding her even though I knew things had gone as well as could be expected.  The anesthesiologist was writing some of her paperwork on the crib bed and saw me crying and kept reassuring me that everything went well and she was fine, but it just didn't make any difference.  I wanted to tell her I knew that everything went fine, but I'm crying, and I can't stop, and it doesn't really have much to do with whether or not the surgery was a success or not.  It had everything to do with having to leave my baby for so many hours, having to actually have the surgery, worrying about the outcome of vision in the eye, thinking about how we didn't know we'd be doing this 1 week earlier, and not knowing what was going to be happening for her in the next days, weeks, years of her life.

This picture was taken when M was taken from the recovery room, where only I was allowed to see her, into another room where my husband and I could both be with her.

This is M's first  experience with a bottle and she doesn't quite know what to think about it.  Although she did figure it out, and thought it was pretty funny!  This kept her entertained for a long time in this room.

Now she realizes that bottle just gave her something she's never had before and it's sweet!  She is thinking this is all pretty funny at this point.

After being in this room for a little bit we were able to get her dressed again in her own clothes.  Nurses were in and out to check on her to monitor how she was doing.  A nurse took out the IV just before we were able to leave.

We got to take M home after surgery at about 2:30pm.  She had nursed a few times, and was generally in good spirits.  We were happy to be able to take her home so quickly after surgery, and wanted to just have her back at home so we could all be back in familiar surroundings looking after her.

These pictures are when we had M back at our house after surgery.

We had to take M back to the Children's Hospital the next morning at 7:30am for a check.  The surgeon was to remove the shield (if it was still on) and check on healing.