Tina, francine and any families having surgery

[Carole]

Just wanted you to know I am praying for you and hoping you will be surounded by love and light in this trying time. May the angels be watching you! Keep us posted when you can. God bless! Carole

[Kathleen]

I made sure I did my praying today for Nicole and Maia and of course Francine and Tina and the families and of course the doctors and staff working on the babies...

I hope all is going well for them tonight
Kath

[Lisa D]

My thoughts and prayers are with you all as well.

[admin]

Wow! What a wonderful feeling to log-in and see so many kind messages and prayers for us!! It makes me very emotional. Thank you all for the kind words. Nicole and Maia had their Capsulodesis surgeries yesterday. I don't feel comfortable speaking for Francine, but I'll try to get her up here to post to you all. I will definitely pass along the many nice words though. Nicole's surgery time actually got bumped up a bit so we were a bit rushed from one nurse / dr, etc. to the next yesterday morning, but I prefer that to waiting longer than anticipated since, as you know, she can't eat / drink. As usual, Nicole was in a lot of pain while waking up in recovery. They started with morphine and went onto Tylenol #3. We were in recovery from about 12-6 pm. Just met another family that had to spend the night there so I'm thankful we got a room. The rooms are beautiful!! It's so much better having a private room. Nicole vomitted many times yesterday until about 11:30 lastnight. Thankfully, that has subsided and we're trying to get out of here tonight and back to the hotel. Then, we'll come back to the OT Dept for a quick splint check before leaving town tomorrow afternoon. The splint looks good. It beats the temp cast which was so tight that it marked up Nicole's tummy. The splint process took about 2 hours, which was very long b/c Nicole was very tired and just wanted to lie down. We gave her some Tylenol #3 before the process started. Bear in the Big Blue House helped us through about an hour of the process. Thank you to whoever it was who introduced me to Bear on this board!!! Right now, we're in the library and Nicole's playing with her Daddy. Maia was going to join us, but I think she took a nap instead. It has been so great to finally, after 2 years, meet Francine, Lou, and Maia. We were at the same hotel and were neighbors there. We're 2 doors down at the hospital. Dr. Nath has been wonderful and has come to see us a couple times in recovery and then in the splinting room and in Nicole's room. He's pleased with how the splint came out.

**Important info about the splint** -- Dr. Nath said that he does NOT want us to remove the splint at all for the first 8 weeks. He said to treat it as a cast. If we need to move it to change the dressing, then we can just loosen it up a bit, but NOT all the way off. Then, we'll just have to do sponge baths for 8 weeks. I'm glad we did this in the winter!! If your child is still wearing a capsulodesis splint, please check with your child's surgeon as to how the new protocol applies to your child b/c remember that every child / injury / surgery is different!!! I'm writing this NOT as new instructions, but as an FYI to contact TCH. Well, Nicole wants Mommy, so I'm done now. Amazed I got this long as she hasn't wanted me out of her sight. I didn't even plan to post now, but I couldn't help it after reading these wonderful messages. I'll copy this and duplicate it under DeShawn's thread since she inquired too. Thank you all again for caring so much. -TNT (Troy-Nicole-Tina)