Four Weeks Post Surgery

Time flies when you are having fun. I have been back at work for nearly two weeks and Connor is now four weeks post surgery. In reality you wouldn't even know he had undergone open heart surgery and this could have been said about two weeks ago .. well unless he lifted his shirt or Huddy tried to play rough and tumble and pushed on the chest which was still a bit sore then. There appears to be no soreness now unless he get a bump so this is great although the centre of the wound still doesn't look the greatest and will remain prominent as the rest of the scar heals beautifully.

I don't know what it is, encouragement, being that bit older, the surgery, greater hunger but we when we have done overnight feeds on our return (approximately 50% of the time), we have only done 200mls which is a measly 40% of what he was having prior to the surgery. He is eating so well and we are soooooooooo close to not needing any top up. Only time will tell how long it is going to take and how we will deal with medications which for his entire six years of life he has had through a tube .. this will be the final hurdle to removing the gastrostomy button. When the time comes, hopefully waving a brochure showing a jumping castle or new trampoline might be enough to learn the required technique to swallow tablets. I would imagine it won't be an easy thing but hey ... we've jumped bigger hurdles.

On a sadder note, Dan at 0ddness has written a beautiful tribute to his little angle Bethy who was taken as a result of complications following open heart surgery and obviously congenital heart disease. You can see his beautiful message to his angel here. When you have a child with a condition as complex as Connor's , you do the hospital(s) often enough to know people who have lost their child to this insideous disease. We think of them often and count our blessings that despite our many challenges we are still fortunate in many ways. Don't be a stranger .. leave Dan a note. Show him us Aussies aren't still cross about them shipping us out to Australia.