Giving Thanks

I just returned from Fairfax hospital where John had his CT scan this morning at 7:30. As many of you know, our pediatrician thinks the plates in his skull may have prematurely fused (the back of his head has been abnormally flat from early on). If this is the case, he will have surgery later this summer, and the results of this scan will determine the course we are to take. More on that later, but for this morning, from the beginning to end, God's hand was so present with us that I am bursting to write about it! I have had a good bit of nerves anticipating this- knowing that it would all be fine, but taking my little one and handing him over to the sedation team to then be placed in the big doughnut of a machine was not a welcome thought. Also, I wished for a grandparent to be here to go with me, as Evans had to be in New Jersey for work.

A good friend of mine loaned her mom to accompany me for the morning. When I arrived in the parking garage at 6:45, Susan pulled in right beside me. Together we walked to the Pediatric Imaging Unit to sign John in. Sweet baby hadn't eaten since 10pm the following evening as I had been advised that he was to have an empty stomach in preparation for the anesthesia. I was so worried that he would be furious and hungry, but so far he was sucking on his pacifier, and was as calm as could be. We waited for about 15 minutes before the nurse came to get us to take us to the scanner. She said we would try to get the images without using sedation first. I thought, "with an empty stomach? yeah right!" Susan and I put on our lead aprons, Susan laid him down, and that's when he started to get squirmy. Then he started to fuss, and then he started to scream. He was hungry, doggonit, and the pacifier would not suffice. The nurse gave him a couple of minutes to calm down, but I stood back from the table, knowing he was not going to. So, she had Susan pick him up, and led us to a waiting room, while the sedation team prepared their equipment in a second scanning room. John was crying his head off. The nurse told the team of anesthesiologists to pick it up, because we had a miserable baby! Well, after about 5 more minutes of screaming, Susan bouncing him on her shoulder the whole time, he quieted down and appeared to go to sleep. She told me to run go tell the nurse that he was asleep to see if we could give it another try. The nurse ushered us into the room, showed Susan where to lay him on the table, and retrieved the lead aprons for us again. She was moving quickly. John was sucking hard on his pacifier, and his eyes were about half shut, but Susan kept her hand on him and kept the passy in his mouth. The nurse laid a heated blanked on top of him, and put tiny little lead apron over his body. She secured his head and then went into the other room to turn the machine on.

Meanwhile, the anesthesiologist was asking me a bunch of questions about John's weight, known allergies, etc. etc. He glanced at John and said "oh, he's barely asleep, he'll probably get fussy again when we turn on the machine. It would be better if we could do it without the medication, but I don't think we'll be able to." Well, the machine was turned on, everyone left the room but us, and I heard Susan praying and speaking scriptures about how "God grants sleep to those he loves" (Psalm 127:2) and about peaceful slumber, and the next thing we know, John has dropped the pacifier and appeared to be in a deep sleep. He then proceeded to lie perfectly still for the 5 minutes the scan took, and the nurse came bounding back in the room to tell us she had all the pictures they needed and that the baby was mine again. I immediately scooped John up and fed him. We were so thankful we got to avoid the whole sedation procedure, and John was so thankful he got his breakfast!

The nurse told me to give our pediatrician 2 hours to call and translate the results. Stay tuned! And please join us in praying that the images will reveal no fusion so that surgery will not be necessary.

"I am the Lord, the God of all mankind. Is anything too hard for me?" ~Jeremiah 32:27

"Yet I am always with you;
you hold me by my right hand.
You guide me with your counsel." ~Psalm 73: 23-24