Caitlin took it pretty well when I told her we were going back into hospital to get her shunt fixed. She told me that it was okay, but she didn't want the sleepy medicine (anaesthetic) because it is disgusting.
We arrived at the hospital Sunday evening, and Caitlin settled in great, even was asleep for 9pm, which is unheard of when she is in hospital. She was even happy to be in a huge big bed again. And probably extra happy because she gets her dummy whenever she wants in the hospital, which is pretty much all the time!
I hopped in beside her and we were both having a relatively decent sleep until a doctor woke me and told me she had to get blood from Caitlin. At 1am in the morning. To say I wasn't happy was an understatement particuarly when I had reminded the nurses many times that Caitlin would be going to sleep soon and if bloods had to be taken, I wanted them done before she fell asleep. So, poor Caitlin was woken by a doctor trying to poke her with a needle. Needless to a lot of screaming ensued, and Caitlin probably woke the entire ward up. No wonder children are terrified of hospitals when they do things like that!!
When it was done I give her a cuddle, hoping she would just go back to sleep but after that I think she was afraid to go back to sleep. It was 4am before she finally nodded off again, only to be woken by nurses at 7am wanting to take blood pressure and to remind me she was fasting.
Thankfully Caitlin went into surgery close to 11am so she wasn't fasting for as long as the week before. The neurosurgeon spoke with us shortly before she went in and scared the crap out of me. I thought it would be a straightforward shunt operation as usual. Then he explained that this shunt surgery would be difficult. That usually Caitlin has large fluid spaces, making it easy to fix, or to replace a shunt. But this time the fluid space was tiny, so even if he got the shunt out, he wasn't sure he would get another back in. In which case he would have to put the shunt on the other side of her head. It was also possible she would need two shunts. And the risk of complications was higher because of the tiny space he had to work with. That all just made it harder to let her go to theatre.
As always my little girl fought and kicked and cried and pleaded as she was sedated. All I could do was reassure her, kiss her, hold her close to me. Then when she was asleep, I drove straight out of that hospital, hit the Disney store and bought her every character from the Little Mermaid that I could find, just because its her favourite film at the moment, every single day she asks to watch it!
When we got back it was ages before they called us to recovery. I was panicking. I raced down, and the first thing I did when I seen her was check her head for how many wounds there was. And there was just the one! Which meant there was only one shunt and it was in the same spot as it always is!
She was a little cranky when she woke up, but as always she bounced back quickly and was playing in her bed a few hours later! She never ceases to amaze me, how strong she is.
Turned out the top part of her shunt was blocked again. Her neurosurgeon said it was fascinating how Caitlin's ventricles always swell with a blocked shunt, but this time they were totally normal, even though the shunt was blocked. Our Caitlin just doesn't go by the book!
The next couple of days passed slowly, they always do in hospital. Not much sleep, lots of observations from the nurses which Caitlin didn't like. Kid got through alot of chocolate as a treat for letting them get a blood pressure reading lol. The only thing that made this hospital stay a bit easier was that her friend from nursery was having a operation too, so the two of them played together :) We even escaped to the hospital canteen for a half an hour so Caitlin could see her little sis :)
After almost four long days we were discharged. But not before one last scan, a DMSA scan to see how Caitlin's kidneys are. She had to lie in a scanner for that one, and had to lie still. Which was no easy task. It was meant to take 15 minutes. Not with Caitlin!!
After that was done it was finally time to go home. Caitlin was one happy girl.
She's got 6 weeks to start independently walking again. Then we have to see neurosurgeon again. If she's still not doing any independent walking, then we will probably be admitted again. Let's hope it doesn't come to that. I think I will burst with happiness if she does start walking again, I'm so afraid it's never going to happen and those two short months she did walk by herself will be the only time I will ever see her do it. I have a strong little lady though, this is just another hurdle, another bump in the road.
No comments:
Post a Comment