Yay! We have closure.

 

We received a phone call at 8:00am this morning letting us know that Dr. Patusko would close Lydia's chest at 9:00am.  Yes!  Thank you!  We were on our way.  We arrived at her bedside at 10:30am just as she was getting all settled again.  She was very sedated but doing well and had no complications.  All things are pretty status quo and that's exactly what they want to see, meaning her heart is handling it's tighter confines and still doing it's job.  Lydia is slowly being weaned off of sedation and woke up a little bit this evening.  That's her Sugar Bear on her head.  Every baby in the NICU and PICU gets one and the nurses use it to cover their eyes and help them sleep with all the lights and interference. 

If Lydia keeps up the good work and remains stable, a few things will happen over the next couple of days.  She'll continue to be weaned off sedation and pain meds.  She'll be slowly taken off all her heart medications.  Her ventilator assistance will be decreased slowly as she wakes up and eventually switched to a nasal cannula and then off entirely.  Once all ventilation is gone we can hold our sweet girl again!  The nurses tell us this could all take a couple of days or as long as a week.  We'll then be moved to the cardiac floor and work on normal baby things, like feeding!  Once normal baby things have been "mastered" by mom, dad and baby, Lydia can come home!