Emergency Surgery

We try our best  to keep life as interesting as possible around here and this week didn't disappoint. It all started about two weeks ago when the Kylie and Jase were staying with my parents in AZ for a week. My mom called one day and said that for the past two nights Jase has woken up complaining of a stomachache. She would take him to the bathroom and help him get comfortable again and that was kind of it. 

Jeremy, Addley and I drove down on Friday night so we could be here for my sisters farewell talk. Jeremy left Sunday and the kids and I had been spending the week just hanging out. My parents had taken my sister Amanda to Nauvoo for the first part of the week so we just hung around, swimming and kept it pretty low key.

On Wednesday night Jase started complaining again that his stomach really hurt. It was weird because the pain seem to come and go. He would be fine one minute and then in pain the next and then go back to being just fine. The kids and I were all sleeping in the same room and between Addley waking up to eat and Jase waking up to complain about his stomach, no one was getting any sleep so I brought Jase out to the couch and him and I tried to get some sleep out there. We weren't out there long before he started throwing up. 

Over the next three day he continued to get progressively worse including throwing up at Hobby Lobby, and then the next day at my sister Ashley's graduation from nursing school. The most puzzling thing to us and maybe should have been the biggest red flag was that he was would act and feel totally fine in between his stomachache episodes and it seemed that there were no rhyme or reason for when they would come on. He also didn't seem contagious and was happy when he wasn't hurting. 

Finally, Saturday came and he definitely was starting to show more signs that he wasn't feeling well.  He wasn't up and playing like he had been the other days and the stomachaches seemed to be coming on more frequently then they had been. As the day wore on, he spent most of it on the couch with a bowl next him throwing up everything he ate. We were doing our best to keep him hydrated, but he was losing energy and would fall asleep in a split second only to be woken up in pain. 

Finally about 12:30 am, he was pretty unconsolable and at one point he actually flopped over on the ottomon and immediately fell asleep and at that point we knew this was serious and we had to take him to the emergency room. So my dad and I loaded him up and headed to Cardon's Children's Hospital that is about 20 minutes from my parent's home. We were met by an amazing team of doctors and nurses that got us right in and started addressing our concerns.

The doctor came in to assess him and as soon as she lifted up his shirt and saw the scar across his belly (not to mention she witnessed him throwing up blood) I think she had a pretty good idea of what the problem was. She ordered x-rays and a CT scan.

The x-rays were easy, but the CT scan was awful! The actual CT scan wasn't the bad part it was the prep for it that was the all time worst thing in the world. 

First off he had to get an IV, which took the nurses four tries to get because of his dehydration. Thankfully they would numb the area first before they tried. Jase was so tired and so out of it that he would just lay there. He didn't care too much about what was going on. 

After his IV they stuck an NG tube up his nose and down his throat while he was AWAKE!! It was absolutely awful!! I NEVER EVER want to experience that as a parent again in my life!!

The poor little boy felt miserable and as his mom it tore me up inside to watch him helplessly!!

It was a relief when pain meds finally kicked in and he became exhausted enough to fall asleep. 

The  results of the x-rays and CT scan shown he had an obstructed bowel and adhesions (or scar tissue) all through out his small intestines. Basically part of his small intestines was either collapsed or possibly dead, we weren't sure, but it was serious and he needed surgery as soon as possible. The surgeon explained that the surgery would go one of two ways. She would first go in laprascopically and take care of all the adhesions and then get a closer look at his small intestines. If it looked like his intestines were just collapsed then she would be able to fix it laparascopically, but if apart of it was dead they would have to cut him open to cut the dead part out. My heart dropped when I heard that. The last thing in the world I wanted was for him to be opened up. As he was being wheeled back to the operating room, I was praying  harder than I have in a really long time that he wouldn't have to be cut open.

He was wheeled back to surgery a little after 8:00 am on Sunday morning. The surgeon and staff were amazing!! All during the surgery a nurse would call me on my phone and let me know exactly what was going on. I can not even tell you how relieved I was when the surgeon walked out to let us know she was finished and told us she was able to do it all laparascopically. He thankfully only had three tiny insiscion where she had to enter and the surgery went flawlessly.  The surgeon explained to us that the end of his small intestines that leads into his large intestines was completely collapsed and basically wadded up into a ball and his small intestines were also laced with scar tissue all through out. Both a result of his surgery from when he was a baby.  We later found out that his stomach is actually tucked up under his liver and  he's got a 15 to 20% chance to having to have a surgery like this again in his life. Neither of which I was aware of until now. 

I couldn't be more grateful for how everything turned out. I remember when Jase was a tiny 3lb preemie going through his surgery for the first time and then developing a blood infection that could have potentially been life threatening, we have always been blessed with the best outcome possible in every situation. I couldn't help, but keep that in the back of my mind as he was once again heading into surgery. I knew we had been blessed in the past and I could only pray we would be blessed again, and we were. Heavenly Father was mindful of my little boy and once again I feel a debt of gratitude and love to him for blessing us.