In Which Leo Gets Cut Up Bad
Sep. 16th, 2005 08:57 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lawnrrdI believe that I forgot to mention it beforehand, but Leo had surgery yesterday. For those of you who want to skip to the end, he's home and generally uncomfortable, but not so uncomfortable that he can't crawl around the apartment.
We got to NYU hospital at about 7:20 in the morning. At about 8, they gave Leo a drink of something that left him stoned out of his spotty little mind. Lauren changed into scrubs and took him into the operating room, and then she left him there with the doctors. We waited for a little over three hours before they came to get us. The surgeon said that the operation went very well. Leo was still pretty knocked out when we got him, but we sat with him for a couple of hours in the recovery room until he was ready to go to his room for the night.
After establishing ourselves in Leo's hospital room, we ordered a deeply mediocre dinner from Better Burger (who did, it must be said, deliver to Leo's hospital room), and then I went home at about 9. I stopped at Rose's Turn on my way and had two strong drinks in the 45 minutes that I lasted. I then went home and had my first good night's sleep of the week.
(We had to share a hospital room because no private rooms were available. The other occupant was a ten-year-old boy from the Philadelphia area whose story was heartbreaking. He had suffered a skull fracture as a toddler when he was dropped while at day care. The fracture caused scarring in his brain, which seems to have left him with uncontrollable grand mal seizures. His doctors at home wanted to perform a hemispherectomy, and his parents had come to NYU for a second opinion. Lauren counted five seizures in the 18 hours we were in the room with him.)
Lauren stayed with Leo overnight, though, and she is now exhausted because she slept only for about an hour. She's had a brief nap this afternoon, but is going to bed any minute now. She actually held him nearly all night because he would scream every time she tried to put him in his bed.
The purpose of the operation was to insert four tissue expanders under the skin of his back. Two, larger than the others, are under the skin above his shoulders, and two smaller ones are at the bottom of his back, just above his buttocks. So far as possible, they are under clear skin.
The incisions themselves are fairly small, but they had to separate a lot of skin from the underlying tissue to make room for the expanders. That hurts. We are told that it hurts a lot, in fact. They had Leo on morphine for about 24 hours after the operation, but now he's home, and we're giving him tylenol with codeine and an antibiotic to head off any possible infection.
Over the next three months, give or take, the doctor will inject saline solution into each of the expanders. As they grow, they will stretch the skin that covers them. When enough new skin has grown, the surgeon will remove the expanders and a good portion of the giant nevus, using the new skin to replace what has been excised. Three to six months after that, Leo will get his second and final set of expanders, and there will be one more operation after that to remove the second expanders and the last of the giant nevus.
Our nanny is here now, and she'll spend the night with him. Lauren's sister will be here Sunday to help.
Probably the biggest risk now is that Leo will be orphaned as a result of one of his parents killing the other in a fit of rage. (Lauren comments: "What do you mean? We haven't had a fight in the last 24 hours." Thanks, honey.)
Further updates as events warrant.
We got to NYU hospital at about 7:20 in the morning. At about 8, they gave Leo a drink of something that left him stoned out of his spotty little mind. Lauren changed into scrubs and took him into the operating room, and then she left him there with the doctors. We waited for a little over three hours before they came to get us. The surgeon said that the operation went very well. Leo was still pretty knocked out when we got him, but we sat with him for a couple of hours in the recovery room until he was ready to go to his room for the night.
After establishing ourselves in Leo's hospital room, we ordered a deeply mediocre dinner from Better Burger (who did, it must be said, deliver to Leo's hospital room), and then I went home at about 9. I stopped at Rose's Turn on my way and had two strong drinks in the 45 minutes that I lasted. I then went home and had my first good night's sleep of the week.
(We had to share a hospital room because no private rooms were available. The other occupant was a ten-year-old boy from the Philadelphia area whose story was heartbreaking. He had suffered a skull fracture as a toddler when he was dropped while at day care. The fracture caused scarring in his brain, which seems to have left him with uncontrollable grand mal seizures. His doctors at home wanted to perform a hemispherectomy, and his parents had come to NYU for a second opinion. Lauren counted five seizures in the 18 hours we were in the room with him.)
Lauren stayed with Leo overnight, though, and she is now exhausted because she slept only for about an hour. She's had a brief nap this afternoon, but is going to bed any minute now. She actually held him nearly all night because he would scream every time she tried to put him in his bed.
The purpose of the operation was to insert four tissue expanders under the skin of his back. Two, larger than the others, are under the skin above his shoulders, and two smaller ones are at the bottom of his back, just above his buttocks. So far as possible, they are under clear skin.
The incisions themselves are fairly small, but they had to separate a lot of skin from the underlying tissue to make room for the expanders. That hurts. We are told that it hurts a lot, in fact. They had Leo on morphine for about 24 hours after the operation, but now he's home, and we're giving him tylenol with codeine and an antibiotic to head off any possible infection.
Over the next three months, give or take, the doctor will inject saline solution into each of the expanders. As they grow, they will stretch the skin that covers them. When enough new skin has grown, the surgeon will remove the expanders and a good portion of the giant nevus, using the new skin to replace what has been excised. Three to six months after that, Leo will get his second and final set of expanders, and there will be one more operation after that to remove the second expanders and the last of the giant nevus.
Our nanny is here now, and she'll spend the night with him. Lauren's sister will be here Sunday to help.
Probably the biggest risk now is that Leo will be orphaned as a result of one of his parents killing the other in a fit of rage. (Lauren comments: "What do you mean? We haven't had a fight in the last 24 hours." Thanks, honey.)
Further updates as events warrant.
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no subject
Date: 2005-09-17 01:31 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-09-17 01:36 am (UTC)i'm glad that it went well, or, rather, as well as it could.
no subject
Date: 2005-09-17 02:07 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-09-17 02:47 am (UTC)If there's absolutely anything a person far far away can do, just let me know.
no subject
Date: 2005-09-17 07:28 am (UTC)Let me know if you need anything.
-Catherine
no subject
Date: 2005-09-17 12:18 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-09-17 01:48 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-09-17 05:44 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-09-18 09:54 pm (UTC)Hope you and Lauren get some sleep!
no subject
Date: 2005-09-19 03:24 am (UTC)Sounds like a long and scary road ahead for the three of you.
*snugs*