Monday, June 28, 2010
Eye update
Jake his first post-op and so far so good. The dr said it looks perfect and his eyes look great and for now his eyes are working together. He did caution that sometimes it doesn't stick so well have to wait and see. 6 weeks till we know but we are pleased with the update and hope for the best. Jake has been a real trooper and made it easier on us by once again not letting pain or surgeries get in the way of his happy-go-lucky attitude.
Friday, June 25, 2010
Eyes Day 3
Jake is in far better spirits two days out and seeming back to normal. He has his moments where he tells us that his eyes hurt but overall he is back to playing around and his smile makes his parents feel much better. His eyes are pretty bloodshot and red which should take a few weeks to subside. Jake has continued to be a trooper and he has the uncanny ability to bounce back from his procedures. Now we turn towards waiting for his appt on Monday with his Dr. to find out when we may know if the surgery was a success.
We will update soon.
We will update soon.
Thursday, June 24, 2010
Eyes Day 2
What a difference a day makes. Interesting enough, we worried that Jake would be up all night but he crashed hard after his long day and it was Luke who woke us up in the middle of the night. Not wanting to disturb Jake, we brought Luke in our room and that wasn't ideal for us. Usually when I bring Jake down in the morning, he eats a little, drinks milk and then plays in the play room. Today he just wanted to lay in my arms and watch a little Noggin. Olivia sat with us and I tried to get Jake to eat a little breakfast bar and finally after Olivia starting eating it, Jake wanted some. I was happy to see him put some food in his system after what he went through yesterday. He was still more lethargic than normal but I could tell he felt better. Jake had his moments where he would tell Sam his eye hurt but overall he was in much better spirits and played with Luke. Around 6pm, Jake was playing with Luke and Olivia and giggling so it was nice to know we had our Jakey back. So his eyes are very bloodshot and as Luke told Sam, Jake's eyes are bleeding. The redness will lessen over the next ten days and he has a follow-up with his Dr. on Monday. Hopefully we'll receive some indication when we might know if the surgery can help Jake. We look forward to seeing Jake recapture his playful spirit and we hope the sadness is behind us.
Wednesday, June 23, 2010
Eye Surgery Day 1
Today we began early having to be at the hospital by 5:30 for Jake's 7:00 am surgery. The goal was to operate on the muscles in Jake's eyes to attempt to get them to work together versus independently of one another. As mentioned previously, we were told it was a now or never proposition for Jake. Operate now and have a chance at saving the eye function otherwise the damage would be done and Jake's eyes would never work together. As a parent, it's never great to operate just to have a chance but as we have with all of Jake's medical care, we will do whatever's possible to give him the best shot in life.
Jake was surprisingly happy while we were waiting during admissions and then in the surgical wait room. They give Jake medicine that was designed to make him silly and drowsy so when we turned him over to the medical staff he wouldn't object. Jake acting a little drunk off the medicine was giggling away and entertaining us all in the waiting room. Once they brought Jake in, we went downstairs where we watched a little of the USA v Algeria World Cup match. This only increased the anxiety levels as the US missed what seemed like 20 chances in the box and went to the half tied up. At that point, we continued our wait with Sam's parents who generously joined us for added support. Before long Dr. Friedman gathered Sam and I to discuss the surgery. He did indicate that he found an unusual aberration in one of Jake's eyes where basically there were threads but no real eye muscle for him to work on and bring the eye lower down in an effort to line it up with his other eye. Interesting enough, Dr. Friedman relying on his 30+ years of surgery found that the other eye was pulled very tight by the muscle so he decided to try to loosen that muscle up and bring the lower eye up versus move the higher eye down. He hopes this solution will work and the brain will take over to keep the eyes aligned. We will see if this will work and as we mentioned this is probably a 50% chance that it will work. One other item to note is that prior to Jake's eye surgery he did not have any depth perception. This surgery may be able to fix that but again we are going to just have to wait and see.
Seeing Jake was an emotional roller coaster, our boy was thrashing about as he woke up from the anesthesia and it was tough to calm him down. He was disoriented and kept wanting Mommy then Daddy then Mommy then Daddy. After 15 minutes, Jake calmed down and we were able to relocate outside of the initial recovery area. There Jake fell into a deep slumber to which what we thought would be a few hours turned into an all day affair. Jake would sleep then wake up and throw up and this pattern repeated most of the day. An expected reaction to the drugs and the pain medication but not to the extent we thought. By 4 we decided to push for his release as he kept asking to go home. We made it home only to have Jake throw up some more after we tried to get him to eat a little food. He was lethargic but being home and around his brother and sister helped lift his spirits. We are a bit worried as he threw up again and we will have to take him to the ER if it happens one more time as instructed by his Dr. For now he is in bed sleeping so we hope he can rest it off and we can put this long day behind us.
One other thing to note, when we went to see Jake the USA was in the 88th minute tied up, it was later that I found out the USA found magic in stoppage time at the same juncture we were seeing Jake for the first time. A great moment all the way around.
Thank you all who reached out with their concern about Jake.
Jake was surprisingly happy while we were waiting during admissions and then in the surgical wait room. They give Jake medicine that was designed to make him silly and drowsy so when we turned him over to the medical staff he wouldn't object. Jake acting a little drunk off the medicine was giggling away and entertaining us all in the waiting room. Once they brought Jake in, we went downstairs where we watched a little of the USA v Algeria World Cup match. This only increased the anxiety levels as the US missed what seemed like 20 chances in the box and went to the half tied up. At that point, we continued our wait with Sam's parents who generously joined us for added support. Before long Dr. Friedman gathered Sam and I to discuss the surgery. He did indicate that he found an unusual aberration in one of Jake's eyes where basically there were threads but no real eye muscle for him to work on and bring the eye lower down in an effort to line it up with his other eye. Interesting enough, Dr. Friedman relying on his 30+ years of surgery found that the other eye was pulled very tight by the muscle so he decided to try to loosen that muscle up and bring the lower eye up versus move the higher eye down. He hopes this solution will work and the brain will take over to keep the eyes aligned. We will see if this will work and as we mentioned this is probably a 50% chance that it will work. One other item to note is that prior to Jake's eye surgery he did not have any depth perception. This surgery may be able to fix that but again we are going to just have to wait and see.
Seeing Jake was an emotional roller coaster, our boy was thrashing about as he woke up from the anesthesia and it was tough to calm him down. He was disoriented and kept wanting Mommy then Daddy then Mommy then Daddy. After 15 minutes, Jake calmed down and we were able to relocate outside of the initial recovery area. There Jake fell into a deep slumber to which what we thought would be a few hours turned into an all day affair. Jake would sleep then wake up and throw up and this pattern repeated most of the day. An expected reaction to the drugs and the pain medication but not to the extent we thought. By 4 we decided to push for his release as he kept asking to go home. We made it home only to have Jake throw up some more after we tried to get him to eat a little food. He was lethargic but being home and around his brother and sister helped lift his spirits. We are a bit worried as he threw up again and we will have to take him to the ER if it happens one more time as instructed by his Dr. For now he is in bed sleeping so we hope he can rest it off and we can put this long day behind us.
One other thing to note, when we went to see Jake the USA was in the 88th minute tied up, it was later that I found out the USA found magic in stoppage time at the same juncture we were seeing Jake for the first time. A great moment all the way around.
Thank you all who reached out with their concern about Jake.
Monday, June 21, 2010
Eye Surgery
Today Jake has his pre-op for his upcoming eye surgery on 6/23. The surgery will attempt to strengthen Jake's eye muscles in both eyes to help them work together instead of independently. We were hoping to wait till Jake's midface surgery since they have to move the eyes anyway. We visited two of Jake's eye dr.'s to see if we could wait but both agreed there would be too much damage done and we wouldn't be able to correct the situation. It's been a nice break from the operating room for us as Jake's last surgery was in May 2008. We have some relief that the procedure is an outpatient procedure and Jake should be back to normal after a few days. We'll keep our fingers crossed that they can repair the eye muscles and potentially restore depth perception which they feel Jake may lack in both eyes.
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