On Monday, August 7, Jacob was scheduled to be the second surgical case. We spent all morning with him, and stayed until they came to get him, around 1:00 p.m. We walked with them as they wheeled him to the elevator that would take him to the surgical floor. It was a very emotional and tear-filled moment when they took him away. Our last picture taken before surgery:
We got our first update at 4:30 p.m., three and a half long hours later. They had completed the Arterial Switch and were in the process of taking him off the heart/lung machine. About 15 minutes later, they called back and said his heart and lungs were working perfectly. Fortunately, they were able to close his chest too. Around 5:15 p.m., the surgeon, Dr. Jaggers came and told us everything went well. A few minutes later, they wheeled Jacob by. They had told us it would take about 45 minutes to clean him up. We waited almost an hour and a half until 7 p.m. to go back to see him. He had tubes & wires everywhere. It was so hard to see him like that, but he also looked the pinkest we had ever seen him!
About 24 hours after surgery, they took him off the ventilator. I remember one of the younger doctors saying on rounds, that he was a "rock star," and ready to come off the vent. But, we still couldn’t hold him because of lines that were delivering medicine to his heart. That evening, they put a CPAP mask on to assist him with breathing, but after a few hours of that, he didn't like it and he took it out himself! They put him on nasal cannula oxygen, and he did fine. We continued visiting Jacob as much as we could the remainder of the week. On Wednesday, the doctor gave the order to have the last line removed that was running to his heart, but it was late in the day, so they wouldn't remove it until Thursday. We had left for a little while and came back, and Jacob was wearing clothes for the first time! This is a preemie-sized outfit!! (The head I.V. is just lovely, don't you think?) Also, look at how pink he is compared to just before surgery!!
By Thursday, the lines were removed and we were finally able to hold him again. We started feeding him from little two ounce bottles. We brought his own clothes to the hospital and started dressing him up! This was taken on Thursday - the doctors who rounded on him just loved it....
Jacob was delayed in getting out of the PICU by fluid build-up from surgery that caused chest congestion and a partially collapsed lung. We were taught by the nurses how to do chest PT. After nearly a week in PICU, on the Saturday after surgery, August 12, we were finally transferred to the pediatric floor around 6 p.m. We were very happy because we could now "room in" with Jacob. It was quite a change for Jeff and I because we pretty much started caring for him around the clock. But, here's two more picture, one from Aug 11, and then from Aug 12, from the last day in ICU...
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