I'm sorry you have to make this compromise, but think all in all you came up with a really good plan. The video conference idea was brilliant. Being the Mom who went thru numberous heart surgeries and spent everynight in the bedside cot, I had to laugh at your, get the coffee, entertain ect. comment ..it hit really close to home (altho I'd never tell my husband that.) How close will you be having surgery to home? Maybe the teen could be a big help in the keeping your son entertained dept. Justin spend alot of his post op time playing video games and would have loved to have a big brother to play them with. Actually Justin's best parts of being in the hospital is when his friends come by and play videos (something I really stink at)
Kids recovery time
- Thread starter RI Mom
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RI Mom
Well-known member
Lyn,
I am planning to stick with the hospital close to home (30-40 minutes) that has done his other repairs... so having friends in will be possible. That got us through the recovery period last time and is what my child remembers the most. I'm sure there will be lots of video gaming going on, DVDs and other distractions. As you know from spending every moment in the hospital with your child, it is soooooo emotionally and physically draining because you have to UP and positive for the kid who is scared, angry, and in pain. You can't deal with your own emotions at all. To me, going through OHS with your child is like running a marathon for weeks on end without a break (not that I've ever run a marathon but it seems like a realistic analogy). Now I'm trying to gear myself up for the long haul. I will not tell my son until a few days beforehand, although I'm sure he will overhear conversations and catch on.
Thanks again for all of your help
I am planning to stick with the hospital close to home (30-40 minutes) that has done his other repairs... so having friends in will be possible. That got us through the recovery period last time and is what my child remembers the most. I'm sure there will be lots of video gaming going on, DVDs and other distractions. As you know from spending every moment in the hospital with your child, it is soooooo emotionally and physically draining because you have to UP and positive for the kid who is scared, angry, and in pain. You can't deal with your own emotions at all. To me, going through OHS with your child is like running a marathon for weeks on end without a break (not that I've ever run a marathon but it seems like a realistic analogy). Now I'm trying to gear myself up for the long haul. I will not tell my son until a few days beforehand, although I'm sure he will overhear conversations and catch on.
Thanks again for all of your help
I agree. Actually I do the hospital /crisis well, I tend to get sick about a month after his surgeries tho, or a month after he is done with all the issues and is home for good and doing well. I do have to say after doing this for 21 years, it sure was alot easier on my back when I was 20 years younger than the last couple surgeries.
RI Mom
Well-known member
You know it's interesting that you mentioned that you get sick after a long haul of surgery with Justin. This last OHS about 4-6 weeks later I began having nightmares about my son having terrible accidents. They were always about my heart child and not my healthy (knock wood) child. I remember that I was exhausted because of course you can't sleep for weeks leading up to the surgery, can't sleep well in the hospital and when you get home, you don't sleep through the night because you are waking up to check on your child. The nightmares were at the point that I thought I needed to see my Dr. but before I did that, they stopped. I think it was like a post traumatic stress symptom. For me, it has actually gotten more difficult with each surgery (Idrees has had other surgeries besides OHS) maybe because of his age. When he was an infant, I was scared but we could just pick him and do things with him. Now as an older kid, you have to explain things to him and deal with his emotions and coerce him into cooperating. Please tell me it gets easier to deal with the kids emotions as they get older and are dealing with these health issues...
MissMelis
Well-known member
Theresa,
For what it's worth - being a "heart child" is all I've ever known, so I think I've learned to deal with it pretty well. Obviously it doesn't stop my mom from worrying, but I'd like to think I have a certain amount of "zen" in dealing with it all.
Have you chosen a surgery date yet?
Thinking of you - this can't be easy for you, I think it's a lot harder on the moms than the kids, truthfully.
Melissa
For what it's worth - being a "heart child" is all I've ever known, so I think I've learned to deal with it pretty well. Obviously it doesn't stop my mom from worrying, but I'd like to think I have a certain amount of "zen" in dealing with it all.
Have you chosen a surgery date yet?
Thinking of you - this can't be easy for you, I think it's a lot harder on the moms than the kids, truthfully.
Melissa
Sorry to say I can't tell you it gets easier. The one thing I figured out going thru surgery with my child when he was 10 days, 18 months, 10 years, 17 and 19 is there is no good time, all the ages (so far) suck for different reasons, when he was a toddler, I felt awful thinking he has no idea why he is going thru this and why Mommy is letting people hurt him and wished i could explain why all of the scarey thiings were going on. When he was 10 we didn't know he was having surgery, he went for a cath and had ER surgery the next day. Which in 1 way was good, none of the presurgery worry/questions ect, But he was drugged from the cath and didn't remember us telling him he was having surgery, and as far as it seemed to him, he expected to wake up with a sore groin and instead woke up on a vent with tubes everywhere. He was furious and thought we lied to him that he was just having a cath it took a couplke days and a couple nurses and docs to get him to believe we had no idea he would be having surgery until after the cath. Then he also woke up with a pacer which was pretty difficult too.
When he was a teen he knew why he was having surgery and that he needed it, but he was also old enough to realize he could die ect so had alot of questions about that and would tell me who to give his video games to or baseball equipment. ect that was hard too.
BUT the good part is, pretty much when recovery is done and he is back to "normal" and also as melis say is pretty zen about the whole thing. One good thing I learnt after one of his last surgeries is he is really good at "going to a happy place" in his head when he is going thru procedures ect that can hurt. He was having an echo post op and the tech said something about him falling asleep and he said he wasn't asleep he was in his happy place. We talked about it later and he said as long as he can remember he's gone to his happy place when going thru medical things so he usually doesn't feel pain much. That made things better for me to know, I guess probably alot of the kids learn to do things like that to cope.
ps I'm odd, I rarely can sleep,(even with meds) but for some reason I sleep great in the hospital, I sleep thru night tests ect, IF Justin calls me I wake up but other than that it is a really deep sleep. NOW If I could just learn to sleep at home.
