Surprise

This will be a short post asking for prayers for Maxwell. I got a call this morning from Dr. Dr. saying that a decision has been made to move ahead with a hernia surgery for Max...tomorrow. I have not brought up the hernia situation yet, because it has frankly not been an issue so far. Disclaimer: the following description will contain frank references to the male genitalia. If this makes you squirm or giggle to yourself a little bit...it is probably time to grow up. Many of you likely know that all life starts off in the female form. The same organs that develop near the kidneys that become a female's ovaries are the "same" organs that descend into the scrotum of a male and become testicles. When little boys, i.e. Max and Wes, are born as early as they are, this descent has not yet happened. What does happen, since the babies are now lying flat with little to no gravity to help the process, is that their intestines loop through the hole into their scrotum that would normally be occupied and closed off in a term baby. Both Max and Wes have this "hernia" in both sides of their scrotum. The boys' motto is "go big or go home." They have both been seen regularly by a team of surgeons who examine the size and severity of said hernias, and these surgeons, upon examination, try to "reduce" the hernia or push it gently back into the abdomen. If this procedure is not met with much resistance, they are happy campers. The typical time line is for little boys to have this surgery done about 1 week prior to their departure from the NICU to their homes. The thought process behind waiting is to let the kids get as big and strong as they can and overcome all of the trillion obstacles that life throws at these babies. Wes' "reducing" procedure went as expected, but Max's did not. Nurse Emily said that when the doctor applied pressure, Max's eyes about popped out of his head and his face turned very, very red. At the risk of sounding off color, I will say only that I do not blame my son for having this type of reaction!! Needless to say, the hernia did not reduce. This is of concern because if the bowel or intestines were to twist or kink, the results, the doctors said, would be devastating. The implication was that it could easily become a loss of life scenario if that were to happen. They are okay with things right now because the blood supply looks good, but they are taking every precaution. So Max is having somewhat of an emergency surgery tomorrow morning at 10:45. The procedure is done by making two incision on either side of his abdomen and essentially lifting the intestine out of the scrotum, letting the testicle assume its rightful position, and then closing things up such that it can/should not happen again. The surgery is quite common, and the risk of blood loss is not even near what it was with the boys' heart surgeries, but there are some risks. The largest of which would be loss of blood flow to the testicle for a long enough period of time that there would be concerns about sterility down the road...a very, very long road.

We covet your prayers for Max and the surgeons tomorrow. Kate and I have been absolutely leveled by all of the information thrown at us about trakes and physical therapy and respiratory therapy and feeding clinics, etc. and our energy level is LOW. Please flood the gates of Heaven with prayers for Max. Pray that God send his Holy Spirit to hold Max before during and after the procedure. Our hearts are broken for all that these boys have had to endure, particularly Max, and just want him to be comfortable and safe. This surgery does not carry the "hope" that it will really help in the near future like the PDA surgery did, so our feeling has been more of a hope that this doesn't set him back too much.