Whew!

Isaac is back in his hospital room.

There is a new, larger, NG tube draining his stomach through his nose and he is very out of it. The tube is painful and he abhors it. At least he was unconscious (for an endoscopy) when they put it in.

The doctor who performed the endoscopy did a good job explaining it (though B told me later that last night she felt the doctor's bedside manner wasn't all it should be and made her feelings clear, perhaps a little excessively. B said that was probably why she was being through and careful in talking with us).

At any rate... good news!

The reason Isaac's stomach wasn't emptying into his intestines is due to the incision from the removal of the tumor. Actually, because of the two operations there. The first time when the staple went in it pinched the stomach a little, closing the opening a bit. When the staple popped out and was replaced with sutures, it was pinched even more. Then, as is natural, it swelled up from the trauma, which nearly closed it all together.

She gave me pictures of it all so I can explain it to Isaac when he is aware enough. (Note, if such pictures make you feel squeemish, be careful because I intend to put them at the bottom of this post.)

The bottom line is that the sutures look good. It is straight, clean, pink. It is swollen, but the swelling should go down in the next couple of days.

During the endoscopy they inserted a balloon and stretched the opening to the intestines a bit to make it easier to begin functioning again.

Meanwhile they will continue to drain his stomach through the tube, leaving it fairly empty. They will turn it off now and then, wait a little while, and then see if there is a build up of fluids or if the liquids are draining away into his intestines as they should.

They expect him to be able to go home in three or four days.

On the off chance that the stomach does not adapt and start channeling fluids where it should, there are two options, but they are unlikely. One is to insert a tube into that opening, but that isn't desirable. Sometimes those tubes are pushed on into the intestine by the stomach and need to be surgically removed later. The other option is to insert a drain through his belly that can be manually drained. Neither of those are good choices, and I trust they will not be necessary.

Brenda has left and probably won't be back until Sunday evening at the earliest.

I need to catch up on my rest, but I think that will be easier now.

It wasn't just a matter of sleeping in chairs or the back of my car, but the stress of wondering what was happening with my son which has worn on me.

I am looking forward to getting him home and getting things back to normal. Well, as normal as things seem to get for me!

OK... Now for the pics. I include them here because I want to keep this online journal complete, though it is a strange and perhaps queezy sight...

To me it is exciting... it is one thing to hear the doctors describe what is going on, and another to see with my own eyes that things are going well.

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The picture in the upper left shows the suture (horizontal line on the left). You can see it is a little swollen, but nice and pink, and well sealed. The picture on the lower right is the line leading to the balloon (which is the yellow thing in the pic on the lower left).



The picture in the upper left here is what the entrance to the intestine after it was stretched open by the balloon. That is a close up of it in the pic on the upper right.