Mason's Surgery- Week 1

On Tuesday April 26, 2011, we were up at 4:30 am getting ready to take our baby boy to the Hospital for his first surgery. I don't think Art or I got much sleep, how could we? Every time I closed my eyes I pictured my baby's face would come out looking like something on discovering channel. Black, Blue, and Bloody. I was not sure what to expect.

We arrived at the hospital around 5:30 am. Mason was asleep until he was called in around 6:30 a.m The nurses came to take his vitals and change his outfit, all the while he had a smile on his face. The surgery lasted a little over 3 1/2 hours, surprisingly during that time I was calm and I felt a peace within. I know that was from all of the prayers that our family and friends had been prayer. God definitely heard them because I should have been a wreck.

I was not really sure what to expect after surgery, but this was not what I had expected. As you can see it was very hard for me, because I did not recognize my son. For the last 4 1/2 months I had been caring for this wide eyes wide smile baby and then they bring me this child and say "He needs mommy to hold him". I have to be honest I did not feel like his mommy. I felt that somehow my baby had been swapped.

As you can see this baby looked nothing like Mason. Don't get me wrong he looked amazing, everyone kept telling me so. There was this heaviness that I could not shake, I could not comfort this baby because I was so disconnected from him. He was very swollen from the IV fluids and his voice was different because the tubes had messed with his vocal cords. I expressed my feelings to my mom about how I felt and she said "Mija you need to pray, and you need to talk someone for help" That scared me becasue I knew how serious this could become if I let this fear and heaviness burden me.

She was right I did need to talk to someone. I needed to talk to God. He had always been there before right? I spent most of the night praying and crying and asking God to help me love this child. MY CHILD. After all he was mine. Then at 2 a.m. I hear a little squeal, it was the sweetest sound ever, it was my son's squeal. I went over to him and his eyes were opened wide and he just looked at me with so much love. I knew then that this was the baby boy I carried for 9 months, the baby I rocked to sleep, the baby I loved no matter what his imperfections were. This is MY baby.

Once he meds wore off he  started displaying the behavior of our little monkey. he would try to laugh and smile and of course try to stick his tongue through where his cleft was.

Dustin came to visit mason and he said ' Dr. fix his lip?"

He was very sensitive and wanted to give his baby brother some TLC

Thank God my mom was here for a week to help us. Mason needed to be fed with a syringe and it was very difficult. Working through the pain, and being cautious of stitches made fore very complicated feeding. She was a great help and support to both Art & myself.

After a day in the hospital it was time to bring our baby home! We were a Little scared but were thankful to have him safe and sound with us!

Mason was not a fan of the arm restraints. His first night at home was awkward for him, I don't think he was very comfortable.

Mason managed to have some fun without bending his arms. No worries he soon realized how to remove both arm bands.

Before my mom went home we had a nice celebration lunch at Rain Forest Cafe. It was a great time and I think we all needed a little break.

We decided to allow mason to have the arm bands off a few minutes a day while we were watching him so he could stretch and exercise his little arms