Update

This is going to be tricky because so much has happened and I don't really know where to begin.  First and most importantly, I want to say that I am so grateful for the faith and prayers of so many people, and that I don't know what we would do without such wonderful friends and family.  We have been so overcome with gratitude for the blessings we have received and the miracles we have witnessed these last few days, and know that the support of our loved ones is directly related to those miracles.  I should say that Tony P. is doing well, eating, drinking, watching Treehouse, and being his usually charming self.  The nurses love him because for the most part he is very compliant, and he always prefaces his questions with "excuse me" and says "please" and "thank you" all the time, so that's a nice perk.  Apparently the one child in my family who remembers their manners is the one who needs to know them the most, so I'm grateful some of that has sunk in!  And now down to the business part of things...

We arrived here on Tuesday night and woke up nice and early Wednesday morning to go through a LONG day of tests and tests and more tests to get him ready for his surgery.  We were also informed at that time that in the event of an emergency surgery, our surgery would have to be rescheduled, possibly weeks down the road.  That was stressful news, for sure.  We were concerned, since the scheduling to come up right now had worked out so perfectly, including child care for the girls, no school for the girls, no teaching for me, etc. etc.  That, combined with a 2-hour echo and many other tests that were hard on Tony P. made for a hard day.  We were exhausted at the end of it, and grateful to have a peaceful home (my aunt's) to come home to.  The next day we just waited.  And waited.  We both had our cell phones with us all the time, hoping that they wouldn't ring to tell us the surgery would be rescheduled.  Praying they wouldn't ring.  Every time they did, I felt bad for whoever was on the other end of the call, because I'm pretty sure they wondered why we were so angry when we answered.  But the phone never rang from the hospital.  We spent the day at the provincial grounds having a great time and Tony P. splashed in the wading pool for an hour, in sheer bliss.  We'd been so guarded about exposing him to any germs prior to his surgery, and on the day before we decided to let go just a little and let him be a kid.  We had a great day with PWL's sister and just enjoyed being together.  We had to be at the hospital by 6am on Friday, so we didn't stay up late to watch the fireworks, but I think we celebrated Canada Day in style.

Friday morning we had to do the third of 3 antiseptic baths to prep him for surgery, so we had planned to wake Tony P. up at 5am.  At 4:55, he walked into our room to tell us that it was his surgery day, and that was how the day began.  He was so compliant and such a pleasant kid right up until they started prepping him for surgery.  He wanted PWL and not me, and that was fine with me, because I don't think I could have held him on my lap without bawling, so I was much better to just sit beside him and read a book.  The same line, over and over again, but I was reading a book anyway.  Or at least looking like I was.  They gave him a drink before they did any IV lines, to make him groggy and forget what was happening, and that basically made him like a little drunk 3-year-old.  He was so relaxed, laughing at everything, really limp - and I think it relaxed us as well.  We were able to spend the last 15 minutes with him as a really fun, happy time, and that was a great way to leave him.  PWL took him in the OR on the stretcher, and then he was gone.  We both had a few tears (more than a few) about leaving our little guy in the hands of others, but we knew that he was in good hands and knew it was the right thing to do, so it was ok for us to go.  The next three hours passed in a bit of a blur - we went for a walk and did a tour of the Peds ICU, and then watched the rest of a soccer game (the Netherlands was playing, so PWL had a bit of an added interest there).  We thought for sure we would be waiting until at least noon, maybe later, but at 11am exactly, our surgeon came out to tell us that everything went well.  They had finished an hour earlier than anticipated, and everything went smoothly.  (the following sentence will include technical terms, so feel free to skip it if you don't care).  His mitral valve, which was causing some concern prior to surgery and was the the biggest unknown, proved to not be the biggest problem.  The biggest problem that nobody had detected, even with all of the tests he had had done, was the VSD, which turned out to be about the size of a loonie.  Considering his whole heart is the size of his fist, that's a pretty big hole.  So once they patched that and closed it, they were able to see the blood flow across, and it was much better, meaning the mitral valve could be left alone.  They fixed the PDA, but were also able to ignore the aortic arch and the coarctation due to some late results from the echo they did on Wednesday.  Which meant that the surgery was much more straight forward than they had anticipated.  (Insert huge sigh of relief here).  We were able to see him within 4 hours of leaving him, and he was awake and asking for apple juice within 5 hours of surgery.  The rest of the time we've been here has been a bit of everything.  He was in the Peds ICU until 2pm today, so for about 24 hours he had a nurse assigned just to his bed, just for him.  The Peds ICU wasn't really all that relaxing, with 10 beds set up in a very small room and no curtains separating them, so not any privacy.  Tony P. was pretty out of it most of the time, although he did watch a few choice DVD's this morning - mostly old cartoons.  We weren't able to stay there last night because there are no beds to sleep in, so we went back to my aunts' and were asleep by 10pm.  It was a long day.  Today we got to the hospital by 9am and have been here ever since.  He was moved to the cardiology unit this afternoon, and for now we have our own room, with lots of natural light, and places for us to sit, and a bed for me to sleep in, so we are pretty happy with the change.  We don't have our own nurse, but it's pretty close to that, and it's quiet on the unit this weekend, so we're feeling pretty lucky.  Tony P. has been doing incredibly well, although the biggest concern right now is that he's too stubborn to pee.  They are a little worried about it, but for now, just a little worried.  PWL has gone back to sleep at the house tonight, and I will stay here.  Tony P. is sleeping, for now, and has had a bit of a traumatic last few hours, puking up everything he has eaten so far today, and being uncomfortable with the pee thing, but in all, he's done really well.  He's had some visitors today, which has been nice, and even though we're pretty sure he knows what happened, we don't think he's overly aware of all the tubes and where they're coming from yet, so hopefully he'll stay oblivious to that until they pull them out.  

Anyway, I'm going to end here.  I know this has been a bit random - not the most well-written post ever - but I'm typing this in the common family room area, and people are passing by, alarms are beeping, kids are crying - basically it's not ideal for writing about the last week, but I'm trying to record it all before I forget, and this is the best way I could think of to do that.  

What I mentioned about the last-minute changes they decided to leave out of the procedure were things that changed his surgery substantially, making it far less invasive and easier to recover from.  I don't feel that this was an accident.  I am certain that miracles happen, and that we experienced one this week with our little boy.  I don't know when I have felt so completely surrounded by love, knowing that people in our family, in our ward, in our community, and even people we don't even know, were praying for our little boy.  I know those prayers were answered this week.  I know I will never fully be able to explain how much that meant to me.  I am still feeling buoyed up by those prayers, and know that the reason I was able to make it through yesterday, today, and the rest of the hospital stay will be because of the prayers of so many people who believed in that miracle.  

I'll try to write again while I'm here.  We do have some pictures, but no way of downloading them, so they might come later.  I'm off to get some sleep - it might be a long night.