Thursday is the day that James finally gets his spinal fusion. We’ve been waiting for this day for almost a year. He was originally supposed to have the surgery last July, but our insurance denied it because the curvature of his spine wasn’t severe enough to meet their criteria. When we saw the spine doc in February, the curve had surpassed their criteria and the surgery was approved.
So here we are just four days away, and Stacy and I are nervous wrecks. Or is stressed a better word? Maybe it’s a little bit of both. Although James has had many surgeries in his life, this is going to be the longest by far. I think the longest surgery he’s had to date has been about 2 hours. The spinal fusion is going to be 6 to 8 hours long followed by a one or two week stay in the hospital for recovery. We will probably wear a hole in the floor in the waiting room from all of our nervous pacing.
We’re not the only ones that are nervous and worried about the surgery. James had been struggling to get back to his baseline after the pneumonia in mid-April so we decided to pull him out of school until surgery so that he would be as healthy as possible for the surgery. James’ teacher had a talk with the class to explain why James wouldn’t be in school for a while. She sent Stacy the following text message.
“Today was really difficult. I told the kiddos and they were all very worried and sad. We talked it out. They asked many questions. I asked them all how they were feeling. All of them said sad except Jay who said scared and Izzy who said she felt ANGRY and needed me to hold her in my lap for a long time. Jack said that he could not talk about this anymore!!! All the ladies were very sad, too. I broke down crying to Cathy at lunchtime. She had to hold me like I held Izzy. So I want you to know that we all adore James with all our hearts.”
~ James’ teacher
Over the past couple of weeks James has been meeting with some of his doctors to get cleared for surgery. The one doctor that we were worried wouldn’t clear him for surgery was the pulmonologist. It wasn’t his usual pulmonologist that he has been seeing for the past several years. It was the pulmonologist at the hospital where the surgery is going to be. James hadn’t seen this doc in about five years, but since he was at the hospital and would be the one called if there were any respiratory issues during or after the surgery, he wanted to get a baseline chest x-ray prior to surgery. We were really worried about seeing this doc because James was a bit gunkier than normal. We really thought he wasn’t going to clear James for surgery, but he did! He did say something interesting at the appointment. He thinks that most of James’ pneumonia hospitalizations weren’t pneumonia at all, but asthma attacks. Nobody had ever said that before.
Yesterday we had one last meeting with the spinal surgeon before surgery. Stacy cried. I almost did, but managed to hold myself together. James was the strong one. He will rock this surgery. He always does. Still, please say some prayers for him. Pray for us all. And remember to check Fans of James Facebook page for surgery updates.
