1st weekend post-op

Martha Grace hasn't been left on her own since she came out of theatre on Thursday. Since then at least one of us have been at her bedside continuously - 24hrs a day. Me and Mark tend to leave the Hospital at around 9pm and come back at 4am, my Mam and Dad are the ones with her until 4am then they go back to their hotel to sleep until lunchtime and Nan & Grandad are here by 8:45am so that me and Mark can have some breakfast. The early starts are hard but we'd do anything to make sure Martha feels safe at all times.

But the early starts when the ward is quiet gives me time to blog.

Since I last wrote an update so much more happened, I keep waiting for something to wrong because she is doing so well it
feels too good to be true.

After I published the post on Friday morning Martha woke up asking to for a drink, she had a few sips of water and then went back to sleep. It was decided during morning ward rounds that her chest drains needed to come out. They gave her two boluses of Morphine for pain relief/sedation and kept up with the continual infusion - so Martha slept for the rest of the day. She refused point blank to take anything  orally. So that she wouldn't get dehydrated they fed her through her NG the (in situ since the operation)

We took over from my parents at 4am on Saturday morning and Martha must have heard us arrive because she was crying for us. We settled her down and she drifted back off to sleep.

At 6am she woke up and was quite chatty, we propped her up to watch TV and before long she asked if she could sit up. The lovely nurse made a seat out of towels for her and she sat there like a queen watching Nick Jnr. She must have been thirsty so Martha asked for a drink of water which she gulped down, then she wanted milk - she drank with a cup and a straw. Soon we wanted to lie down and dozed for half an hour or so. When Nan and Grandad arrived Martha have Grandad the biggest smile - it was the first time we'd seen her smile since her operation. While me and Mark were at Breakfast, she little diva had a sulk when she saw the Doctors arrive for ward rounds and even turned to sleep on her tummy.

She refused to take anything orally for the rest of the afternoon, but I reasoned that when she's thirsty or hungry - she will ask for a drink  herself. The more we tried to coax her the more she would refuse to take anything for us. She vomited up a bit of the mucus from her chest - I stayed as long as I could with her before running out of the ward leaving her with my Mum and Dad...still terrified of her aspirating like she did before.

While I was in the Lagoon about to have a panad with Mark's Nan and Aunt, his Grandad joined us with the news that they were packing up our things and moving Martha Grace up to Bear Ward!!!

53hours after Open Heart Surgery and our little girl was doing so well she has been moved off Intensive Care.

We've never had her move this quickly  before, she has amazed us this time.

Once she got settled in last night she ate a little of toast for us, has eaten two pots of yogurt and been having some of her drinks orally.

We're currently in a 4 bed bay in the High Dependency Unit waiting for a single cubicle to become available on the ward.

I am so grateful that she's doing so well, I couldn't have dreamed that she'd progress this quickly. It's amazing how strong she is. Please keep the prayers coming because they certainly are working a miracle here!

GM
xx