Post Surgery

Friday morning Christian had a surgerical procedure.  I figured it would not be a big deal and I didn't need any help...wrong!  He had a bad reaction to one of the drugs and when he woke up he was like a wild animal. He was screaming, kicking, thrashing around, and you could tell by his eyes that he wasn't with it. It took three nurses to help me keep a hold of him because he was trying to fling himself out of the bed/crib.  I would hold him but he would push against me so hard, that at one point I actually dropped him and was thankfully right by the bed and swung around just in time so he landed on the bed.  We thought we would just leave him in the bed after that, but he kept thrashing around and banging his head on the metal rail.  I was calm but could feel the fear welling up fast.  What the hell was wrong with him?  How long will this last?

While he was thrashing around, his IV came out and blood went everywhere.  I had him in my arms, one nurse holding his arm while another nurse worked on getting the IV plug out and a band-aid on.  By the time it was done, there was blood on the bed, floor and all down the front of me.  (Later when we left the hospital, people were staring at me and the blood all over the front of me.  Would have been interesting to know what they were thinking. )  They called the anesthetist doctor to come up because Christian's reaction was so bad.  After about 10 minutes into his bad reaction, they gave him Tylenol.  After another 10 minutes he had calmed down enough for me to be able to hold on to him, but he was still crying and pushing on me.  I walked up and down the hall a bit and that helped some.  After a total of 30 minutes, he fell asleep and I plopped into a chair, exhausted.  Of course after the drama was over is when the doctor shows up.

The nurse explained to him what happened and he said people do have bad reactions to that drug and it appears that Christian had a REALLY bad reaction.   I asked if it was over, because I didn't want to go through that again by myself when we got home. He said it has run it's course and when he wakes up, he should be "normal".  Sure enough, when he woke up he was tired, but his normal self, thank God!

He did ok the rest of Friday and also on Saturday.  Today was another story.  The surgerical site was causing him ALOT of pain and I felt so helpless because there was nothing I could do to help him.  They gave us Tylenol with codine but it didn't seem to help that much to me.  When it would hit, he would scream in pain, fall to the floor and thrash around. It would pass quickly and then he would cautiously go back to playing.  I had him stay still as much as you can make a toddler by reading, coloring, play-doh, you name it, we did it. 

I'm going to take him to preschool tomorrow and will see how that goes.  He may not be able to stay the whole day and I'm going to tell the teachers that if he's too uncomfortable, to definitely call me and I'll take him home.  I just pray he is a fast healer.  I made sure the nurse wrote down the name of the drug that he reacted to, so if he has to have it again in his future, we'll know what to expect. I also know now to ask for help for these types of situations.  I see an early bedtime for me tonight :)
~Amy