Surgery #5

On August 30th, Eli had another surgery on his cleft lip/palate. 

They took away some of the thickness in his nostril and re-opened his nasal cavity. The surgery last time left him with a tiny opening to breathe through. That was 2 years ago. I had NO idea that he had a hard time breathing through his nose. He would always wake in the middle of the night complaining about his nose, mostly when he had a runny nose, and I would get frustrated because...

"IF HE WOULD ONLY LEARN HOW TO BLOW HIS NOSE!!! "

I said this several times.

(go ahead and pass me the mother of the year award)

They also revised the scar on his lip and the space between his nose and lip. They also took a piece of cartilage out of his left ear and placed it at the base of his nostril so that it wouldn't collapse. Therefore, he has an incision behind his left ear to get skin to cover the part they took in the front of the ear. Poor baby.

Without further ado...pictures in the hospital.

His nurse, Kathy...which he refused to say...said her favorite color was green as well!

Here, she is explaining the O2 monitor. She said that it was like a little hug. I pointed at him and said "E.T., phone home." He looked at me like I was crazy.

We had a little surprise for him...we bought him a Leapster Explorer. He was beyond excited! We also bought him the Ben 10 Ultimate Alien game....which was a HUGE hit.

Here are some after he got his "happy juice" to make him calmer. When they took him back the anesthesiologist was awesome. Eli started to cry, but the anesthesiologist raised his bed and asked Eli to hold on to the invisible steering wheel. Then he asked him to step on the gas pedal. When Eli did that, the bed started to move so he got to drive himself into the OR.

Here he is when we first saw him after surgery. My poor little guy.

I can't believe how much he has grown. This was his first surgery at 2.5 months!

Warning:

Bellow this text are some pictures of his incisions.

Here he is after we got home. He felt awful, but he was back to his normal self the next day.

I can't believe how GROWN UP he looks in this next picture. he looks WAY older than 4yrs 4mo!

He is my brave little man.