Day 6 Post Op

HOME TIME!!!

After 6 nights in hospital we were discharged today!!! Our day started at 4.30am when Harper was woken by the nurses bringing a new patient into our room today (we were in a shared room that sleeps 4) as our new room was really light she thought it was daytime and time to wake up and play, after an hour of trying to get her back to sleep I gave up. Our lovely nurse came in and offered to take her while I slept a little more. 2 hours later at 7.30am I went out to get her to find her playing with the nurses and loving it, she was loving being the centre of attention. All of our nurses had been wonderful!

The plastics team came by at 8am and gave us the all clear to go home. Harper had breakfast and a bath then we packed up waited to be discharged. At 9.30am we finally left for home! We don't have a helmet and are going to see how we go without one and will readdress it on Friday.

Harper is loving being at home and getting into everything she can find. Her swelling has gone done heaps with only a little bit left, mostly around the eyelids, centre of the forehead and on her right side where there is also some bruising.

Here is Harper the day before surgery and 6 days after surgery.

Before / After

Harper's incision is looking really good, most of it is covered with her hair, you can really only see it on the sides.

**WARNING**

**** GRAPHIC****





Day 5 Post Op

Harper's swelling continued to go down today. We were also transferred to a shared room to make room for a little baby. Lucky it was only for 1 night as it was right behind the nurses desk, so at night it was still really light in the room and Harper thought it was play time. Harper spent the day playing, she is back to old self laughing, playing and being VERY cheeky. She had another bath today and her incision looks really good, as she still has a lot of hair it is covered really well and only noticeable from close up.

Day 4 Post Op

When she woke up in the morning her eyes had opened up a lot more and she could see easily. We spent the whole day keeping her entertained. She was in a great mood and was content to play.

Harper wearing her beautiful headband kindly sent to her by the Cranio Angel Network

Day 3 Post Op

Overnight Harper had become very restless and was relentless in trying to rip off her bandage. The nurse bandaged her hands, removed the morphine drip and gave her some painkillers. She went back to sleep and slept well for the rest of the night.

That morning, much to Harper's delight, her bandage was removed!!!

About 30mins later her right eye cracked open and not long after her left opened up too. From that moment on we had our old Harper back! She also had learned how to stand up!!! So I spent the whole morning chasing her around the cot trying to make sure she didn't fall and bump her head. As she didn't need the antibiotics anymore she could have her drip disconnected. After waiting and waiting for the nusrses to come do it we gave up. Harper got dresses for the first time and we headed to the playroom with the drip in tow. She loved it! The police even came for a visit while we were in there and had a little play for, when she started to crawl around it was time to go back.

After lunch the nurse removed the drip and Harper had her first bath since surgery. It was so great for her to not be connected to anything, she could just play as much as she wanted and we could take her for walks around the hospital (even to the McDonalds in the foyer).

That evening the nurses removed her central line and she was now free of everything! All she needed was Panadol every 6 hours.

Day 2 Post Op

By day 2 swelling was at it's peak, Harper was still on the morphine drip and around noon it was reduced to .5ml per hour. Her bandage was really annonying her and she kept tugging at it. In our care package from Cranio Care Bears was a gorgeous hat that was large enough to fit over her bandaged head so we put that on her to stop her from ripping it off. She also kept kicking the IV in her foot with her other foot and I noticed it was half out and the nurse removed it, she still had the central line in her groin and didn't need anymore bloodwork taken so it didn't matter.

1 Day Post Op

Overnight Harper had woken and ripped the nasal prongs off her face and kicked the cathetar out. Luckily she didn't need either of them anymore. She was still very sleepy and only woke in short bursts. By morning her eyes had completely swollen shut. Throughout the day she was staying awake for up to one hour at a time and was content to lay in her cot and play with her toys. She kept trying to poke the IV in her hand and as it was a spare anyway they removed it at the end of the day.

Surgery Day- July 19th

Harper needed to fast from 2am so I woke her up for a feed at 1.30am and put her back to bed. At 4am she woke up and wanted another feed to help her back to sleep, after 30 mins of grumbling Pete (Daddy) put her in her carseat and took her for a drive to get her back to sleep, at 5.30 they come back inside and Harper is wide awake and playing.

The grandparents arrive at 6am to look after Paxton who was still fast asleep. We leave at 6.30am, leaving plenty of time to get to the hospital for our 7.15am appointment. Unfortunately there were several accidents that morning causing traffic chaos all over the city. We called to let the hospital we would late and arrived at 7.45am.

Once at the hospital we were whisked off into a private room to talk to the anaesthesist, then taken back into a large room where Harper was given some Panadol and something to make her "drunk". The main anaesthesist and the plastics team was there to talk to us. Once the meds had started to kick in we were taken to a waiting room in the operating wing where we put on her gown and waited for her to be taken back. The anaesthesist came and spoke to us again and our surgeon came past to touch base before the surgery.

At 8.30am it was time to start. I carried her back to a small room where I laid her down on a big bed on top of a heated air matress. They put the mask over her face and she went to sleep. I said goodbye and we were led to the waiting room.

At 2.30pm, 6 hours later the surgeon called us to let us know that she was out of surgery and tha everything went perfect. He said in about 30mins we would be called back to recovery to see her. 2 hours later at 4.30pm we were finally paged to recovery. Harper was having a cuddle with one of the nurses who told us that she had been very unsettled so she sat down and held her. They passed her to me and we had a cuddle. She had a central line in her groin connected to a morphine pump and a drip, an IV in her hand, an IV in her foot and a cathetar. Her oxygen levels were a little low so they also put some nasal prongs on her. transfered her.

After about 30 minutes she was transferred up to the ward. We were given a single room painted with an Aladin theme.

Harper was getting 1ml of Morphine every hour and had an extra 1ml twice in the first day, she was also getting panadol and antibiotics. She was sleeping most of the day except for approx. 15min intervals every few hours.

We were on the other side!!!