post op

so i'm back with a report.

um, yeah. my kid is a freaking ROCK STAR!!!!!!!!

i believe my first tweet this morning was "big h moved me to tears. such an amazing little boy. in surgery right now. told all of the staff about batman."

seriously. i'm not sure if the morning could have gone more smoothly.

besides the fact that i did NOT sleep last night. you know those nights where you are awake and you look at your watch and it says 1:15. then you wake up and look at your watch and it says 2:26. then, 3:10. then, 4:32. and at 4:32, i just stayed awake. i was so afraid i wouldn't wake up on time. and afraid that buz would oversleep.

never mind the fact that buz has overslept ONCE since i met him. he wakes with the roosters. sometimes earlier.

so i got up and read FB messages, blogs, etc. finally got out of bed at 5:30 and got dressed and put my bag in the car and got everything ready to put big h in the car. i got him (out of the deepest sleep possible) at 6 and took him to the car, thinking he'd stay asleep.

you'd think after five and a half years, i'd know. to say that the boy is a morning person is a gross understatement. as i was carrying him to the car, he whispered, "mama, please make sure you bring truckformer." (fyi: truckformer is a transformer in the shape of a truck. and big h renamed him. for obvious reasons.)

and then, he talked and talked about how truckformer would be sad to be left by himself and we should definitely bring him and he and batman are good friends and batman gets to come and there's a chance goo might break transformer while i'm gone.

oh my.

last night, he made sure his batman jammies were clean because he was adamant about dr. m seeing his batman jammies. and he may have said it once or twice. or maybe a couple more times.

it was dark the entire drive to the hospital. and the boy never did stop talking. all while i was picking the nighttime crusties out of my eyes. but i loved every minute of it. we don't get a lot of one-on-one time together. so this was fabulous.

we got there, and he immediately said, "hi, i'm big h, and i'm five and a half, and this is my batman, and these are my batman jammies. dr. m has never seen my batman jammies." and by immediately, i mean that i think we had actually crossed the threshold. i couldn't stop smiling.

we waited in the lobby for a while until he realized that he had left his star wars lego guys in the car.

ALERT! ALERT! STAR WARS LEGO GUYS LEFT IN THE CAR!

we came back and all was well with the world. in the words of my little man, "whew, that was a close one, mama."

we sat in that lobby for what seemed like a sweet forever. then we went in another office to sign consents. in the meantime, he had put a second pair of jammies on top of his batman jammies and told the pre-op lady that "i probably just look like a regular big h. but really, i'm batman disguised as a regular old big h."

she smiled really big. and because i'm biased, i'm almost positive he made her day. and it wasn't even 7 yet.

finally, we got taken back to the pre-op prep room. he got a pulse ox on, and the nurse was so fun to let him watch the monitor when he didn't keep his finger still. he loved it. she weighed him. um, i rock. i guessed his weight TO THE POUND.

then, we waited in the pre-op exam room for about an hour and a half. he had grown weary and the newness and coolness had officially worn off. and the only kid channel we could locate was pbs kids. which is fine. but he doesn't really care for arthur or martha speaks.

thankfully, we looked around some more and we were able to locate playhouse disney. oh, i have never been so glad to hear the spanish sounds of handy manny and his tool friends. felt like home. except with a lot more beeping and sterile-ness.

finally, dr. m came by to say hi. he has started ranking right up there with dr. g. big h loves his man doctors so much. dr. m loves the heck out of big h. i mean, they've been seeing each other every three months since big h was eighteen months old. they have a bit of a relationship. so he came in asking if big h wanted a hat like him. and we showed him big h's jammies, even though big h was QUICK to inform that he did NOT like the gown he was asked to wear. "it itches, and it's like girl jammies."

i will say, for the record, that the ONE thing big h talked about more than anything else was the freaking gown. i told you he was a hoss, right?

so about ten minutes after dr. m came by, the anesthesia RN and the anesthesiologist came in. the RN was awesome, talking to big h about cleaning his ears and "getting this show started." and the anesthesiologist came in talking about wearing a space face mask that had gas in it, and he would take a short nap and then see mom again.

i thought, for sure, big h would lose it at this point, and that he would be scared and not want to go.

(side note: i specifically requested NO VERSED because i don't like the wake up that it causes. and the anesthesiologist said, "well, then we'll do our best to make it as fun as possible so he won't be anxious.")

and that, they did. they pulled up the rails of the gurney and wheeled my little man back to the OR.

and i walked out. and cried. and not out of sadness or fear. God had already taken care of those things.

but out of pride. i couldn't believe my little man was not such a little man. he was a boy. who was confident in those taking care of him. he was confident in his rad doctor who has ALWAYS taken care of him.

i sat in the waiting room for i think eighteen minutes.

dr. m came out and said everything went great, that he had woken up groggy but calm (praise Jesus). and then he said, "you know, mom, your kid's got a great disposition. he had everyone laughing and smiling back there. there never was any fear. he did great. he's ready for you now."

i wanted to cry again. i walked up and pulled the curtain and saw my little man who looked FIFTEEN. he looked scared, like he wanted to cry. i put my fingers through his hair, something he normally doesn't care for so much. but he let me. which was awesome. and then, he seemed like he wanted to cry. and sometimes he'll look at me like that, and once i say, "bud, it's ok to cry if you need to," and then he'll cry. like he has permission. so i asked if he needed to cry, and he said, "no, i don't think so."

but the sweet recovery nurse, colleen, said, "you know what? i'm going to lay his bed down for about fifteen minutes or so and let him get some good, deep rest." and that's what he did.

and for almost twenty minutes, i got to sit, alone, and look at my beautiful first born. no one was around. i just got to stare at him. and marvel at who he is and who he's become. and where we've come together, him and me.

and shocker. i was teary. this motherhood thing gives me the waterworks.

finally, he woke up, and the FIRST THING out of his mouth was, "mama, i really need to not have this gown on. can i have my jammies back?"

we got him dressed, and the cute nurse made sure he had everything he needed for a "rockin' show and tell" tomorrow. how fun is she? she gave me the hat and mask he wore, his pulse ox monitors on his toes, his stickers that monitored his heart rhythms, and of COURSE his tubes. which are, by the way, the size of a small hang nail. hard to believe something so small could perform such a HUGE job.

big h got to go to the car in a wheelchair. normally, he would've thought it was really cool, but he was GROGGY.

we got to the car, and buz had bought the darth vadar lego figure and ship. for this day. for his courage and bravery. and you talk about something that changed a mood in 6.3 seconds. we were getting ready to leave the parking lot, and i kind of just mentioned that i felt something in the bag, and then i showed it to him.

and the heavens of big h's world opened up wide.

he talked the entire way home. i told him he could have anything he wanted for breakfast. his request was for "crunchy potatoes," or hash browns from whataburger.

we came home, and goo had missed him so much. he never did show any signs of fatigue.

we had lunch and then i put goo down. i was wiped out, so i got on the couch, and he and i watched a show and he played about ten or fifteen minutes of lego playstation. then, he took himself into his room, got under the covers, and headed to nighty night land. and stayed there for two and a half hours.

and it's safe to say that i have NO IDEA the last time he took a 2.5 hour nap. fatigue finally won out.

and that was it. he's had three doses of tylenol, and he's asleep now.

but he is SO READY for his own personal show and tell tomorrow.

so to recap: i love my little man and look up to him for his maturity and trust and good nature and humor and bright view of life.