Recovery

The recovery process for open heart surgery is complicated and intense. There are wires and tubes everywhere giving fluids, medicines, and oxygen and draining and clearing out fluid. It is a slow, meticulous process to start removing and weening things. Each removal of a tube or wire is a small victory and a sign of progress.

Owen did very well overnight after his surgery. He was heavily sedated, but his numbers were looking good and the doctors were very pleased. There had been talk of removing the breathing tube Saturday, but since he arrived late on Friday, they decided to let him rest all day. Owen remained sedated and on pain mediction while the breathing tube was in. He would stir every once in awhile, but the best thing for Owen was to keep a low heart rate and blood pressure and to sleep.

Sunday morning the breathing tube came out. In order to take the breathing tube out, Owen had to come out of his sedated sleep so he could breath on his own. He did wonderful and quickly started breathing well, but he was still pretty out of it and dealing with some pain. There were a couple of major sources of pain for Owen that he had to deal with. The first and most obvious was from the surgery. The second source was from the chest drainage tubes that were clearing fluid out of his lungs and chest. These were up in his chest and against the nerves in his lungs. Those would come out as soon as the drainage subsided. The third source of pain was coming from intense, migraine like headaches. The Glenn procedure takes the Superior Vena Cava, which in a normal heart connects to the right atrium, and connects it to the the pulmonary artery. The Superior Vena Cava brings blood from the head to heart and then is pumped into the lungs. Because Owen has a single ventricle physiology, the blood flowing from his head is now flowing to the pulmonary arteries and into the lungs. This new path of blood flow causes some pressure to build up in the head before the body gets used to it, causing severe headaches. Owen has been a warrior dealing with all these sources of pain. We were lucky enough to get to hold Owen on Sunday. It was alot of work to get him out of bed with the tubes, but we were encouraged to hold him because it soothes him, helps clear out his lungs, and it helps with the headaches to have his head up.

Owen got one of his chest tubes out Monday morning, but the other two were left in to continue to drain. He was very puffy from the surgery and had retained alot of fluid that needed to be drain. He started to wake up a little bit more and he opened his eyes and looked at us for the first time since his surgery.

On Tuesday, Owen had an EP study to determine if an arrythymia could be triggered and if he needed to go back on his heart meds. We got great news that they were unable to trigger any abnormal beats and that they would not be putting him back on the heart meds at this time. It does not mean that he would not have the arrythmyia anymore, but it was a good sign.


Owen had a little more pain on Wednesday and had trouble sleeping. The exhaustion was evident on his face, but he just could not sleep. He finally slept well Wednesday night, thankfully, because he had a big day Thursday. He had the remaining two chest tubes removed, which immediately eased the pain. Owen also had a line in his jugular from surgery that was being used to give some meds and fluids that needed to be removed. Unfortunately, they still needed access for emergency meds or fluids, so instead of another IV, which have not been the greatest with Owen, they decided to place another PICC line. Owen had a new PICC line placed in his right arm which goes all the way through his vein and sits in his Superior Vena Cava. Owen did great with the procedure and with having his jugular line removed.

From this point on, the main focus is getting Owen to tolerate his feeds and weening him off of oxygen. He continues to progress and do well and everyone is pleased with how he is doing. As of Friday morning, the hope was that we would be moved to the step down unit on Monday.

We would like to thank all of you for your thoughts and prayers. The support has once again been overwhelming. We would also like to thank The Browns, The Mix's, and Amy Celesti for sending very thoughtful gifts for Owen. We were also lucky to have Aunt Carol and Uncle Randy send up a homemade dinner and a gift and the Hambleton's also sent a homemade dinner, which all really hit the spot. We can't thank you all enough for continuing to support us and Owen.

This has been a tough week for Owen but he continues to fight and we can't wait to see that smiling face again sometime soon. He is getting close to flashing it, but not quite all the way there.