Success!

Thank you so much for keeping our baby girl in your prayers yesterday!

Her surgery took place in the morning and was a success. Her doctor came to speak with us in the pediatric waiting room as soon as it was done - before she even got back to her room - and told us just how it went, and how great she did.

We were able to go back and see her, which was a little upsetting as she was on her back with her arms spread out and held down to the bed. They needed to observe her and keep her from grabbing onto the drainage tube that has to stay in her side for a few days following the surgery. As a mommy, it was hard to see, knowing that she really just wanted to be curled up and swaddled.

I could tell right away, though, that the surgery had made a difference when a nurse came and repositioned her ventilator tube. Its placement had been so precarious prior to the surgery because of the constriction by the double arch. If she pulled her head back and the tube shifted, even just slightly above where the constriction was, it cut down her oxygen supply and her alarm would start beeping. After the surgery, though, the nurse completely bent the tube at a 90 degree angle to reposition it. I watched her do it and then instinctively whipped my head around to check her monitors, anticipating that her oxygen levels would plummet. They didn't budge. This was such a huge indicator of how successful the surgery was.

When we met with the doctor on Saturday afternoon, he gave us several things - diagrams of what a normal aortic arch looks like, illustrations of what Brigid's arch looks like and what the surgery will do, and some of her MRI pictures that show how much the arch is constricting her trachea. These were fascinating to look at. The images are cross-sections of her body, as if you were looking up through her feet.

In this one, the yellow arrow is pointing at what her trachea looks like above the point where the double arch was constricting it:
This one shows her trachea at the constriction point. Notice the huge difference in the size of the opening:

And finally, this is her trachea, open once more, just below the constriction point and as it branches into two to go down to her lungs:


It's so amazing to look at these and to see exactly what is going on, and how it has affected her physically. Usually, doctors don't insert the ventilator tubes as low as hers is, but if the tube was above this constriction, she didn't get enough oxygen and more importantly in her case, couldn't get rid of her carbon dioxide. Below this point is the carina, right between where the branching occurs, and if the tube touched that, it caused a vagal response that made her heart rate drop. There was probably less than a centimeter of wiggle room between the arch and the carina, and because she is so strong, she could easily move her head enough to cause the tube to displace and either touch her carina or to move back above the arch.

The fact that the tightrope walk that happened all day long finding just the right spot to prevent either of these things is no longer an issue is such a relief! Patrick called last night and I called this morning to check on her, and both times her nurse said she was doing great. She didn't have any incidents of bradycardia (dropping her heart rate), desaturation (dropping her oxygen levels) or increased CO2. It seems that the surgery has already made a significant difference and was a total answer to prayer!