In addition to James’ many other medical issues, he also had a testicle that wasn’t fully descended into the scrotum. The medical term for this is cryptorchidism. The doctors had told us that this was not completely abnormal, and to wait and see if it comes down on its own. James is now 17 months old and it still hadn’t come down so yesterday he had outpatient surgery to bring it down.
Side note: Stacy is not a fan of the word testicle; she prefers “berry”.
The procedure is called orchiopexy. During the procedure, the surgeon makes a slit in the groin, brings the testicle (or berry) down into the scrotum, and “tack” it into place. I put quotes around tack because that is the term that the surgeon used when we were discussing the surgery. I cringed when he said it. I immediately thought of how painful it would be to have a thumbtack piercing my berries! I’m sure it wasn’t as painful as it sounded.
Before surgery pic:
James made it through the surgery without any issues. The surgeon told us that there was a chance that the berry might work its way back up. If it does, then we will need to discuss having it removed. Hopefully it will stay where it belongs, and we don’t have to go that route.
After surgery pic:
Today James has been a bit “juicy” with secretions and his heartrate is a bit high. He probably has a bit of pain and/or discomfort from the surgery. Normally Stacy would put him on his belly to let gravity drain the secretions from his nose and mouth, but she wasn’t sure if he should be on his belly so soon after the surgery. She was worried about putting pressure on the groin area. She did the best she could to keep up with suctioning.
