Fontan Photo Gallery

This is a bunch of pictures we've taken so far.  They range from the night before his surgery (Tuesday the 16th), the day of surgery and thus far into his recovery.

***Warning -- some of you may not want to see some of these pictures.  There are some of his chest where you can see the stitches holding his drainage tubes in place, the tubes themselves (including the bloody drainage), some dried blood on the dressing covering his chest incision, and several have a drugged up baby in them.  We're not trying to gross anyone out.  The description sounds worse than seeing the pictures themselves! The first few are okay, I'll let you know when you're about to see something listed above. 

This may be the last good picture we have of his dark lips!  This was taken in Aunt Ashley's bed after the boys' baths Tuesday night

The three of us in the pre op area the morning of surgery

So many people posted pictures of them in their Eli's MVPs shirts & we had to return the favor!  My mom said we looked like a bunch of m&m candies!  We certainly had a lot of attention from the shirts.  Thanks to our surgical liaison for taking the time to help us out by snapping a pic of us.

We had to include a silly face picture!

Zachary playing his Leapster while we waited for Dr. Abraham

A post op Eli is in some of the following pics.  I know some don't want to see Eli in this post op condition.  If you're sensitive to that, turn back now!  Also, there are some of the things I listed like drainage tubes & dressings.  Again, if you're squeamish, turn back now!

Some of his post op equipment.  He probably looks small to most of you, but to us he looks huge in this bed because we've seen him in it when he was MUCH smaller!

The tower of drips.  These were the medicines keeping him alive and sedated.  He was on Amiodarone, Dopamine, and Milrinone (those three are for his heart function and/or rhythm), Fentanyl and Precedex (for pain control/sedation), and IV fluids continuously.  Those were all going through a central line.  These were just the continuous meds, he also had regularly scheduled ones going through other IV sites.

Eli's vital signs (about 9pm the night after surgery).  The green line is his heart rhythm (the white spikes between the green ones show when the pacemaker fires.  The yellow is showing his respiratory rate.  The blue shows his oxygen saturation...do you read that 98?!?!  That's right, before surgery his sats were mid 70s and now they're upper 90s!  The white numbers are his blood pressure taken externally (the normal way you're thinking of, with a cuff on the arm or leg).  The red line is his arterial blood pressure.  It's taken by a sensor placed in an artery in his wrist.

He looks so long!  If you look at his head, on his right you'll see a "stick" with four prongs coming off it.  That is leading to the connection for his central line, which was placed in his neck.  The brown rectangle on his abdomen is covering the incision for his pacemaker. 

You know how some people sleep with a foot sticking out from under the covers?  Well, Eli kept sticking his cute little toes out of the crib.

His favorite comfort item -- Daddy's chin.

We're in Room Nine in the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit

Does anyone else remember him laying in his hospital crib with his hand over his eyes?  We do!  He did that when he was a little, little baby!

Zachary brought Eli a plush dinosaur from the Children's Museum.  He got himself a pair of dinosaur chopsticks and had to use them to eat his Arby's fries. 

His o2 got up to 100%  That's actually a little too much for his reconstructed heart.  This was a temporary number for him & we just thought it was cool because he's probably never had an o2 of 100!

We brought a lot of movies to keep Eli entertained.  We thought we'd use the tv in the room but the Child Life Specialist came in & said she'd bring us a portable DVD player so he didn't have to look up toward the ceiling.  The dinosaur watching the movie is what Zachary brought to Eli from the Children's Museum.

Eli's hospital band is on top.  Bryan and I are each wearing one as well.  The smaller band on the bottom is his blood bank identification number.

A little closer photo of Eli the night of surgery. 

Bryan hid in the bathroom to eat a cereal bar so Eli wouldn't see him.

Eli sat up for a long time in his bed today.  He watched DVDs from 10am to 8pm....with several naps mixed in!

Of all the echos Eli has been through in his life, I've never gotten a picture of him getting one until now.  His head is off to the side because he's trying to see his movie around her arm.  The screen at the top shows one of the views of his heart.  I can't read an echo, but I believe this view is of the mitral valve that was repaired in the first part of Eli's surgery Wednesday.  This picture also shows some of the monitor wires attached to him as well as his right JP drain tube.