Graham's Surgery

The past 7 weeks have been a wild ride for us in the Burns home.  The first 4 weeks of Graham's life were a difficult adjustment for me.  Like I said in my last post, maybe I'll write more about that later, but the 4th and 5th week of Graham's life were CRAZY!

One Saturday night, Clint and I had just put Graham down and were about to get in bed...at 8:30!  Haha.  Clint luckily heard Graham spit up in his crib over the monitor.  We went in there and he was covered in spit up...we're talking A LOT of spit up.  We gave him a quick bath and back to bed it was...thinking little of it.  The next few days Graham started spitting up a lot more, in fact it was more like vomit.  So, I called the doctor on Tuesday and they told me to put him on soy formula.  We immediately went and got some soy and that didn't help at all!  It just made the vomit chunky and smell even worse.  He had a few good days and then it started back up again and this time it was projectile!  Gross! 

We had a splash zone set up in the living room...that was the only place you could burp him so just in case he did vomit (which he was doing every feeding by now) then the beach towels would catch it and you'd be safe.  It got so bad that Clint and I would actually undress Graham and pretty much ourselves before any feeding.  At times it was quite humorous.  Here's a pic of the aftermath....

I was asking all sorts of people what to do.  Some said...oh babies spit up, it's no problem.  Some told me to feed him less, some told me to keep him up right when we were feeding, but NOTHING was working.  So, I called the doctor again on Friday but everyone was gone for the afternoon.  Luckily, Lauren and Scott (Clint's sis and bro-in-law) were coming for a visit and they are both residents at OU medical.  Lauren is a pediatrician so we had them check Graham out.  At first they weren't that worried, but when they were able to see the projectile vomit after just one ounce of formula they knew something was wrong too.  So, they suggested on Saturday that we take Graham to OU medical.  Altus hospitals couldn't do anything for us our doctor was out of town and they'd send us to OU anyway if something was really wrong.  So we bypassed Altus and headed to OU on Saturday. 

Lucky for us we had those connections.  We were in the ER a total of about 30 minutes when they diagnosed Graham with pyloric stenosis, exactly what Lauren and Scott thought it was.  Basically, food was not reaching Graham's small intestine.  It was all staying in his stomach so he had to vomit it up.  It was heart wrenching to know that he'd have to have surgery, but we were so thankful to have an answer.  They would just go in and cut that muscle so that food could pass through it.  

They checked us in to the hospital and gave Graham an IV...poor baby!  We couldn't feed him all night because they wanted his stomach empty for surgery.  That night wasn't as bad as I thought.  My mom came up and stayed the night in the hospital with Graham and me.  Together we got through it! Doesn't he look so sweet post surgery?!?!

Then surgery was at 8am on Sunday morning.  Handing my 5 week old over to the doctors was the HARDEST thing I've ever had to do.  They don't know him, they don't know his cries or his personality....and they are about to put him under.  Heart wrenching for this new momma.  But, surgery took about 30 minutes and then it took him another 30 minutes or so to wake up and we were back with him in no time.  Everything went so well and he's just got 3 little scars now. 

I was so thankful that everything fell right into place. Thankful that Scott and Lauren came when they did, thankful that my parents were just coming for dinner that night so they could be there with us, thankful for the connections at the hospital and so thankful that the Lord had his hand in it all.  If your 5 week old has to have surgery, this is the way to do it. 

So now Graham is SOOO much better.  He keeps feedings down, is awake so much more and is making poopy diapers just as he should.  (He didn't make one for 4 days!)  So there ya have it....my precious Graham is a champ and we're so blessed that he's better.  Thanks for praying and being a part of our little guys life!