Pre-Fontan heart cath, check.

Hi friends.

It's been a long day. Evan didn't sleep well last night and we were up by 5am. Surgery registration was quick and we were back in the cath pre-op area by 7:30. Evan was pleasant until it came time to place his IV. It took four of us to hold him down :( Once he got the IV, it was pretty much impossible to keep him calm. The anesthesiologist came by a short while later and gave him a little dose of versed. Evan was instantly as high as a kite. He was giggling at everything, swaying back and forth, and babbling away. We met with the cath DR and went over the plan. He said they should be done in an hour and a half to two hours. Scott and I went down to the RMH and ate breakfast while we waited for an update. After and hour and a half without a phone call, we called into the cath lab. The DR had just located a large collateral vessel and was going to measure it to see if he needed to coil it. 45 minutes go by and we received another update- the DR had a hard time accessing the collateral and had just made access. They estimated another 45 minutes before they were finished. The cath DR came out and said all went well! He coiled just the one collateral and Evan's pulmonary artery pressure was excellent. Evan's pulmonary arteries are slightly narrow but the surgeon plans on stretching them out a little tomorrow during surgery. It was another 30 minutes or so before we were allowed back to see Evan. He was MAD as fire. Thrashing around and crying.. After a cath, a patient needs to lie flat on their back and still to prevent bleeding. The nurses helped place Evan in my arms and I attempted to calm him down but it didn't help. He was super groggy still, coming off of anesthesia, and pinching and smacking me. It was rough! We transferred over into our room at the CVICU and Evan and I got comfortable in a chair. We've now been in this chair for almost 5 hours. He finally went to sleep about 45 minutes ago and I am enjoying all of the snuggles. :)

Our surgeon's physician assistant came by this afternoon and we went over the game plan for tomorrow. Evan is the first surgical case of the day and is scheduled for 7:15am.  The surgery tomorrow is the final stage of Evan's 3 stage repair. He is having an extracardiac fontan. The surgeon will connect a synthetic tube from his IVC to the pulmonary artery. I asked the PA if she could find us a tube similar to what will be placed in Evans heart and luckily enough, she had one in her desk drawer. It was huge! Much bigger than what I expected. I snapped a quick picture of Scott holding it for you to see..
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Thank you guys for all of the support and prayers you have offered our family. We know it is only because of God that we had peace today and the strength to be strong for Evan. Please continue to pray for him as he heads into surgery tomorrow morning. I will be sure to update our blog as we get updates from the surgeon tomorrow.