Titus had surgery to correct the birth defect of his urethra/ penis on the 2nd of August. The operation took 3 hours. They extended his urethra from the base of his shaft up to the tip where it belongs. They used his foreskin to accomplish this. They did some cosmetic stuff to his penis, unbending it and cutting the skin where it had been sort of tethered to the scrotum.
The end result was a gruesome mess, just like I expected. They did show me lots of post op pictures to try to prepare me. We took the bandage off on the second day after the surgery. he has a catheter stitched into his penis which is needed for the formation of the new portion of the urethra. He will have it in for a total of 3 weeks. During which time he is prone to infection. In fact this particular procedure has the highest rate of infection and complication of most any reconstructive surgery. He wears 2 diapers. One in his regular tiny size 2 to catch the poop. The second one we thread the end of the catheter into and it catches the pee. When he poops it gets all over his surgical site and catheter which freaks me out. He has to take an antibiotic to prevent infection but it gives his loose stools which in turn gets into places where it could easily cause an infection!
Titus has been getting 4 different medications daily. We give them with an oral syringe. He has come to HATE this and hold a grudge against us for doing it. I would say he fights tooth and nail but he does not have much in the way of teeth. We thought he had a little toofer coming in towards the back but it seems that it was a trick of the camera flash. Anyhow we don't know if it was his aversion to having things forced into his mouth,a heat wave, pain, decreased appetite from the meds, but something made him refuse nearly all fluids for 3 days. This landed him in the ER monday night. They came close to admitting him but really did not want to because of the risk of hospital based infections. They just kept offering juice and formula and he kept refusing. They gave him until late Tuesday morning when they planned to admit him and start an IV. Lucky for us he decided to drink 7 oz of his formula and we got to go home.
I was awake for 30 hours and exhausted by the time we got home yesterday. Titus and I both slept for 5 hours while Brian worked from home and looked after 5 year old M. Titus took 18 oz of formula yesterday and 2 jars of pureed fruit. Not the greatest but it was better.
here he is shortly after waking up from anesthesia
and here he is towards the end of our ER stay yesterday
The end result was a gruesome mess, just like I expected. They did show me lots of post op pictures to try to prepare me. We took the bandage off on the second day after the surgery. he has a catheter stitched into his penis which is needed for the formation of the new portion of the urethra. He will have it in for a total of 3 weeks. During which time he is prone to infection. In fact this particular procedure has the highest rate of infection and complication of most any reconstructive surgery. He wears 2 diapers. One in his regular tiny size 2 to catch the poop. The second one we thread the end of the catheter into and it catches the pee. When he poops it gets all over his surgical site and catheter which freaks me out. He has to take an antibiotic to prevent infection but it gives his loose stools which in turn gets into places where it could easily cause an infection!
Titus has been getting 4 different medications daily. We give them with an oral syringe. He has come to HATE this and hold a grudge against us for doing it. I would say he fights tooth and nail but he does not have much in the way of teeth. We thought he had a little toofer coming in towards the back but it seems that it was a trick of the camera flash. Anyhow we don't know if it was his aversion to having things forced into his mouth,a heat wave, pain, decreased appetite from the meds, but something made him refuse nearly all fluids for 3 days. This landed him in the ER monday night. They came close to admitting him but really did not want to because of the risk of hospital based infections. They just kept offering juice and formula and he kept refusing. They gave him until late Tuesday morning when they planned to admit him and start an IV. Lucky for us he decided to drink 7 oz of his formula and we got to go home.
I was awake for 30 hours and exhausted by the time we got home yesterday. Titus and I both slept for 5 hours while Brian worked from home and looked after 5 year old M. Titus took 18 oz of formula yesterday and 2 jars of pureed fruit. Not the greatest but it was better.
Wow, you sure have had a rough time of it. I'm glad he made it through the surgery well and I sure do hope the rest of his recovery is smooth! He is SO adorable:)!
ReplyDeleteI hope things are getting better now. I'm so sorry that you had to endure that, it cannot have been at all pleasant. Just remember in all of this, to look after yourself.
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