Big City Doctor, fix me up and make me right....

Alot has happened in the last 48 hours so I will do my best to catch up to speed. We are currently in the Pediatric ICU (picu) which allows Mercy to have constant, undivided attention.
Transplant surgery went really well, Dr. Wachs was very pleased with the results. I was able to finally see her around 3:00 pm. She was bright~eyed and feisty as ever. She IS a rockstar.
The new liver did not have to be 'cut' to fit which can help present fewer issues with bleeding and other things. Sweet.
Because the liver was donated from a child twice Mercy's weight, it can tend to be a little big at first (more on that to follow).  Immediately following surgery, the medical team pays very close attention to fluid retention, glucose levels, electrolytes, blood pressure, pain management, etc. (There are too many "etc.'s" to list)
The first night out of surgery was a little rough. There was constant traffic in the room. Many hours of comforting and soothing her on my part, all hours of intensive care on the medical team's part. She experienced a "3rd degree heart block" about 3am that scared me (and our nurse) tremendously. She was immediately hooked up to an EKG, which ended up being "normal".  Positive. They performed 2 ultrasounds on her to monitor her blood flow through her portal vein and elsewhere. The blood flow was evident in most areas but didn't have a strong signal in others.
The following morning (yesterday), another ultrasound was ordered, this time Dr. Wach's observed. He was concerned with blood flow through the portal vein which has been an underlying issue for Mercy since the beginning. (Portal vein thrombosis) Very important because obviously the new organ needs to have the blood supply it needs to function. 
We were told that Mercy would more than likely end up in the OR again following transplant so the news to follow was not unexpected but never easy to swallow.
Dr. Wachs was "on the fence" about taking her in to OR. I had came in the room and mentioned that Mercy's belly looked much more distended today and was much firmer to the touch.  Her girth was measured and indeed it showed an increase in size. Being very in tune to mother's intuition and following his own intuition (the sign of a GREAT doctor, in our opinion...huge respect for that), he decided to take her in.  Bitter: gotta open her up again...Sweet: by looking inside, not at a machine's view (ultrasound), we would know FOR SURE what was happening . If things are looking great, awesome, sew her up and don't touch a thing.  If things are not great, we take care of them now and not wait til "later" and have more issues. We will take this scenario any day over 'Rejection' of the new liver. Dr. Wachs can unclog portal veins, he can't force the body to accept it's new gift........
So, it was agreed....we were on our way to another surgery.....1:00 pm Sunday 08/07/2011


"You can sit in the grass if it feels good....
You don't even need to say a word....
You don't have to worry................at all"