It's on

Needless to say, the past couple of days have been pretty stressful for Iggy and me. Not only were we not sure what we wanted to do about Magnus's surgery, I was very worried that he and I would have trouble agreeing about what we wanted to do. The more Iggy thought about the surgery, the more concerned he became about it, and he started talking about trying NG feeds again.

We hadn't come to any resolution, and then yesterday, Magnus's cardiologist e-mailed me and said she wanted to talk to us. We agreed to talk to her on the phone this morning, and resolved to make a decision after that.

If you are a regular reader here, you have probably learned by now that I am not the type to blindly follow the advice of any medical practitioner. But we have something pretty close to complete faith in Magnus's cardiologist. She has always tried to work with us when we wanted to do something differently, and we know that she cares about him deeply and has his best interests at heart.

She was quite blunt with us. She said that putting off Magnus's surgery for another few weeks would be very dangerous, and that it would make the surgery sufficiently risky that there would be a real chance that he could die. And well, after she said that, it was pretty obvious what we had to do. We also discussed the possibility of revisiting doing the surgery endoscopically, and she said that she didn't think it was a good idea in general for cardiac patients, and especially in his case.

We check in to the hospital on Wednesday, and if all goes according to plan, we should be there about a week.

So, this means that we have to cancel our vacation, which is a huge disappointment for us. My parents rented a house at the Jersey Shore, and the plan was that we'd spend the first week there with my parents, my sisters and their husbands, and my new nephew I haven't met, as well as my aunt and uncle and several of my cousins, none of whom has met Magnus. Then we were going to drive up to Massachusetts and see Iggy's side of the family, including Iggy's brother, who still hasn't met Magnus, and a bunch of friends. And finally, we would drive up to Maine with Iggy's mom for Magnus to meet his great-grandfather.

We probably can make the trip back East as soon as Magnus is healthy enough to travel, but it won't be the same. There will be no week at the shore with my whole immediate family around. And we while everyone else is there without us, we will be at home recovering from yet another surgery, or perhaps even still in the hospital (that would make for maximum self-pity potential, wouldn't it?).

So yeah, we're pretty hugely bummed out. And yet, after we'd made the decision, we both felt oddly relieved. We'll get through the surgery, and then we'll finally be able to fatten him up, and won't have to worry every day about how much he is eating, and we'll go back East later, and even though it won't be the same, Magnus will still get to meet everyone.

p.s. Oh yeah, and then we gave him a bath and weighed him this evening, and the little stinker had gone and gained 80 grams in the last 2 days! Unfortunately, it's too little, too late.