Cath day

We dropped Magnus off in the cath lab at 10:20 this morning, and they've told us it will take 3 or 4 hours. They gave me a pager, but they're not going to page me until they're done unless they find the need to do any interventions (unlikely) or if something goes wrong (even more unlikely). We are a little nervous, of course, but this is much easier than dropping him off for surgery.

This morning, however, was pretty miserable. As I mentioned before, Magnus was scheduled to be the first case in the cath lab, but what they failed to take into account in telling us when to come in is that they start late on Tuesday mornings because they have a weekly meeting. We're used to and pretty tolerant of "hurry up and wait" most of the time, but this time was pretty awful because they told us to stop feeding Magnus at 2 a.m. (when we could have actually waited until 4 a.m. to start his fast). He started getting pretty unhappy by 4 a.m., and by the time we got to the hospital he was screaming inconsolably.

Then they told us that he needed to have an IV placed before being sedated so he could have blood drawn so they could check his blood type in case he needed a transfusion. I pointed out to them that he had already undergone multiple blood transfusions in this hospital during his previous stay and that I also happened to know his blood type. But apparently there was no getting around it, it was "hospital policy." So anyway, between the hours of fasting and the insertion of the IV, he was very unhappy and so were we. Finally, the team from the cath lab came to collect him and gave him what they described as a mild oral sedative...which knocked him out immediately. He was clearly pretty exhausted from all those hours of screaming.

Despite all that, it was nice getting to see so many of our old friends from the unit. When we walked in, a bunch of our favorite nurses all came up and mobbed Magnus's stroller like he was a rock star. I imagine it will be nicer to visit with them this afternoon when we're not consumed by trying to comfort a ravenous baby.

Based on what they told me, I'm expecting them to finish up a little after 1:30. I'll try to post an update as soon as I can after that, but things might be a little hectic.