And I can tell you why. First though let me say that I have a number of pictures and comments to post as well as a furnituremaker to introduce you to. I'll get to all that in the coming days.
Anyway, the cliche goes that minor surgery only happens to other people. In this case, the other person was my 9 month old daughter Alyson. Alyson was born with a cleft palate back in April. She was lucky in that she only has cleft palate and not a cleft lip as well. The cleft palate is repaired with one surgery and theoretically she is set for life. A cleft is simply a hole in the roof of the mouth. Because of this she couldn't nurse, much to the sadness of my wife, and had to drink from special bottles up until this point. When she ate baby food most of it came right out her nose. She is such a happy child it really didn't seem to bother her much, fortunately. We discovered this in the hospital at birth when she wasn't able to nurse and we got hooked up with Connecticut Children's Medical Center's cranio-facial team. I have to say, the cranio-facial team and every single person we met at CCMC was absolutely amazing. The take care of kids like a religion. I am sure most, if not all, children's hospitals are the same. Alyson's surgery was Friday January 30th. It was routine to them but certainly not for us. She went in at 11AM and was done about 1:20PM. In that time she had tubes put in her hears and three sets of sutures put in her mouth. One for the cleft, one for a pit in her lip, and one to free her tongue (she was tongue tied a bit too). It was a pretty bloody surgery, as this procedure is, but I am happy to report that she is doing great. We stayed at the hospital one night and by Saturday afternoon she was drinking enough (from a cup) to come home.
We are very happy to have the surgery over and done with. She is on the road to recovery and should really start to develop verbal skills now. One of the challenges of a cleft is speech, and by fixing before she starts speaking it should take care of any impediments. Alyson is drinking well from a sippy cup and is eating baby food like its going out of style. We are thankful for CCMC and the cranio-facial team. Our surgeon, Dr. Castiglione, was absolutely amazing. And I must say this too: A visit to a pediatric hospital is both an amazing and frightening thing. As tough as this was for us, we had it easy compared to many. It is heart breaking to see the children and families suffering there. My heart goes out to all of them. I am amazed at the quality of care the nurses, doctors, and staff provide for every child and family there.
That's all for now.