Thursday Kiereney Update

Thanks to everyone who kept Kiereney in their thoughts and prayers on Wednesday.

It is a day I never want to repeat in this lifetime.

A supposedly one incision, one hour surgery turned into an almost 3 hour 2 incision surgery.

The original drain was from her spine, across her side and attached to drain into her abdominal cavity.

The lumbar peritoneal programmable shunt was mounted at her 12th rib on her right side. Bandages prevent me from getting an exact look at the incision and the ever helpful(ahem) neurosurgeon was not long on detail. From what we could pump out of him, the original tubing was left in her spine and across her side. The tubing was cut at that point and pulled(yes, you may GROAN here as it as been there for 6 months and tissue has grown over and around it) out of her abdominal cavity and the programmable shunt was mounted at her 12th rib and connected to the old tubing going back to her spine. The new tubing of the programmable shunt was then supposedly put where the old tubing was and draining into her abdominal cavity.

It will take a couple of weeks for the swelling in the spinal column to go down and then we will know if the shunt is set to the correct settings. If it is not and she still has headaches, then the shunt can be adjusted electromagnetically through her skin using fluoroscopy and a magnet device.

Her blood pressure got into the low 70s during surgery and is just now climbing back up into the low 80's. They attribute this to dehydration(you THINK after the sump pump pumping out all her spinal fluid for the last.six.months?), the anesthesia and the pain pump.

She was able to take ice chips Wednesday night and picked at a breakfast tray this morning. Her IV infiltrated during the night and had to be changed(she has lousy veins and changing her IV is quite an event).

I am going to get her up into a bedside chair today and see how she does. I don't possibly see how she will come home tomorrow(original release date) and will keep her there until her pain(incisional and headache) can be controlled with oral pain meds and her blood pressure is up to normal.

I hope this is the end of her year of hell and the beginning of a new life with the world hers just for the asking.

Again, thank you for all your prayers and good thoughts. You cannot believe how they sustained us yesterday. She was petrified before surgery yesterday and I told her that a lot of people were praying for her and she needed to just let go and let God. I am so, so proud of her yesterday and in the past year as she has dealt with this pain and loss of sight. She gives me the strength to get up each morning. She is my hero.