Slowly Shrinking...

Maia is a little over 2wks old now. She had her surgery at just 4 days old but her chest is still not closed. She was really swollen several days ago and her little kidneys have had some trouble getting rid of all the fluids, so she was put on dialysis to help speed up the process and shrink her down. Unlike dialysis for adults, they will run the dialysis machine continuously because she is too small to handle the amount of fluids in just a few hours. They actually tried to close her chest this past Thursday but the surgeon said she was still too swollen. They explained that when they close her chest, the heart will have less space to function, so any extra fluids will compress the heart and also put more pressure on it... so right now the best thing for Maia is to continue the dialysis and get as much fluid out as possible before closing her chest. At the same time, the doctors don't want to wait too long to close her chest because the risk of infection increases the longer her chest stays open. For right now the goal is to close her chest on Monday, Sept. 16... let's hope and pray this will finally happen, and we can get rid of her "banana peel patch" as Marcus calls it!

Although it's taken her a long time to get rid of all the fluids, Maia is really shrinking before our eyes! We've seen her at her puffiest and now she's almost back to normal. She's very alert and even though she sleeps a lot, she opens her eyes every so often to take a peek and see what's going on. The nurses want to make sure she gets her rest and not have her move around too much, especially since her chest is open and she's connected to so many tubes and wires.. but she's a mover! So I feel bad when she's moving around so much and they have to give her some meds to calm down.

Maia @ 10 days after surgery

Maia @ 2 days post op,
 her most swollen

Maia @ 5 days post op

As for life outside the hospital, we try our best to keep things normal as possible. Marcus is enjoying kindergarten and he now reads bedtime stories to me, instead of me reading to him!! We attended his "Back to School Night" where his teacher was eager to show us his family picture... very impressive! Other parents were also in awe of his drawing. We had to explain about Marissa and Maia, and what was going on in our lives right now... they were all touched and couldn't believe how a 5yr old could express himself in his drawings. 

Maia looking into Daddy's eyes

Gordon on the other hand, is dreading his return to work. He's been off for 3 weeks and that time off has gone by so quickly! He wanted to take some more time off but his boss has been calling and wanting him to work. Since he's been off work, I guess sales and productivity have gone down, and now some of his coworkers are going on vacation leaving his boss somewhat desperate. So as some sort of compromise, Gordon has agreed to work half days, instead of his regular hours. This allows him to spend some time at the hospital with Maia, where both his heart and mind are at all times regardless if he's at the hospital or at work, or any other place. He knows he's going to have to return to work sooner or later... he was just hoping it would be later rather than sooner!!... or if we win the lottery, he won't have to return at all! (Wishful thinking on his part!) I think he's actually more stressed out about his work situation than he is about Maia. But we'll find a way to make it work, we always do!!