The big op, and "That" question...

Brae had his operation two weeks ago today, and all went better than we expected. He got sick of waiting & threw an almighty tanty in the kids' waiting room, and I noticed most of the other parents were giving us the "Thank god it's not my child" grin.

Which of course had the domino effect, and most of the kids took a turn in being grumpy. You get a room full of hungry, bored, over-tired kids and you must expect a few complaints :-)

After the op (35 minutes of cold waiting torture for his parents) we were taken to see him in recovery. He had his own nurse (all the kids did) which was great, but had it's downside too. I saw the shunt in the back of Brae's hand and said "You'd better remove that fast before he wakes up, otherwise he's going to freak and rip it out".

"No", she replied, "it must stay there in case we have to take him back into surgery. He could start bleeding and we'd have to act quickly."

"Well," (I countered), "a sure-fire way to get him upset, screaming, and likely to start bleeding is if he wakes up & sees that in his hand."

She wouldn't budge. I'm not knocking the nurse - I realise it was more than her job was worth to buck the system, but sheesh... the system should recognise that parents really know their kids' triggers. (And given that this kid's mother woke up in hospital aged approx 13, and ripped out her drip before anyone could stop her was kinda relevant, don't you agree?)

Another 20 minutes passed, and they had to wake Braeden up. (tickle a tissue under the nose to imitate a fly.. awesome how well it worked, must remember that)

He stirred... looked around blearily, looked at his hand.... RIP!

It came half out, the nurse made a grab, Brae started yelling at the top of his lungs.

Blood everywhere. And yes, they eventually did take the ruddy thing out because it was past the point of no return. Brae still has a massive bruise on the back of his hand from the ruckus.

Somehow I managed not to say "I told you so" with anything more than my eyes. Probably because my mouth and the rest of me was working overtime to calm down and restrain our hysterical and now very sore son.

Blood staunched (from his hand, luckily none from his nose or throat or ears), cleaned up, we were moved to the post-op waiting room for observation. Three hours later we were allowed to leave. One of the children in the waiting room kept telling the other parents "Shut up, be quiet, you're too loud!". A bit of a clue that the grommets did in fact make quite a dramatic difference to the children's hearing.

That night when we got home, Brae heard a plane fly overhead and for the first time he could tell the direction the sound came in. Each day we hear:

"What's that noise!??" (that's the birds in the aviary)

"What's that noise!??" (the washing machine in spin cycle)

"What's that noise!??" (the fax machine picking up a call)

and so on.

Poor wee man... he's living in a whole different world. Kindy worry that he's more subdued than before his op until I pointed out that he's actually hearing all the other kids now, and is having to learn how to tune their voices out. Something the rest of us take for granted.

His speech is coming right along, helped by the improvement in hearing and also by having much more room to flex his tongue now that the adenoids are gone. He's gone from a mumbly little part-time chattermonkey to a full time question-and-soapbox marathon. Child holds forth on all manner of things, just about every waking moment.

Can't think who he might have taken after in that regard, can you?

And just last night, he demonstrated that not only his he catching up to his peers, he may be getting a bit ahead of them. I certainly wasn't expecting THIS conversation at 3 and a half!


(Setting the scene... we were watching TV and an article came up on some newborn twins)

"I love babies", Brae announced.
"Would you like a baby brother or sister one day?" I asked.

Brae pondered that for a few moments then nodded "(y). . ess."

We sat & watched for a little while then he turned to me and asked, "Mummy, where do babies come from?"

(Gasp! Okay.. remember vow to self that you would deal with this honestly but age-appropriately... OMG I thought I'd get some time to prepare for this question)

"Well darling, a mummy grows a baby in her tummy with a bit of help from the daddy. When the baby is ready, it is born. You grew in my tummy for a long time."

Brae looked at me sceptically, looked at my midriff, grinned and said "Nawwwwwwwwwww!"

So I showed him the ultrasound scan pic of his cousin and explained "This part is Aunty Chris's tummy, this is your cousin Lyndon who is growing in his mummy's tummy. See, there's his head, his nose, his hand, his tummy?"

Brae examined the picture critically for some time, then handed it back with a satisfied nod & ran off to play with the toy crane.

Oh man... they grow up too fast!