In January of this year, Sadie was diagnosed with Intermittent Exotropia. It looks similar to a lazy eye, but a lazy eye deals with the muscles of the eye and Exotropia deals with the nerves. Basically, Sadie's brain wasn't "talking" to her right eye, so if she looked out of each eye alone, she had fantastic vision; but if she looked through both eyes at once, she wasn't really using her right eye.
We were told that about 1/3 of the cases resolve on their own in about a year, 1/3 stay the same, and the other 1/3 get worse and require surgery to repair the problem. We had a feeling that Sadie would be one of the 1/3 that would require surgery since we weren't seeing any improvement at home, so we weren't shocked when the doctor recommended it, but we were still scared out of our minds to be putting Sadie under anesthetic for a big surgery at such a young age.
Here we are! 10 months later, sitting in one of the waiting rooms before surgery.
All changed into her adorable, tiny surgery clothes, waiting for the doctor to do her final pre-op check up.
The nurse brought us bubbles while we waited. So impressed with Primary Children's!
Our tiny kid was so enamored with all the fun stuff they had to play with, she didn't even mind leaving with the surgeon and anesthesiologist when it was her turn. They offered her a wagon or car to ride in and she just grabbed the doctor's hand and said "I wanna walk!" So off she went with the surgeon in one hand and the anesthesiologist in the other. Holy adorable.
This picture breaks my heart. Sadie had a REALLY hard time waking up from the anesthesia. Her right eye was draining badly and she kept trying to rub it. That's not allowed, obviously, so they put those horrid braces on her arms which made everything worse. She wasn't able to open her eyes, couldn't move her arms and was crying and crying and crying trying to figure out what was going on and why she felt so awful.
They finally had to give her a little dose of morphine to calm her down and once it kicked in she was Very subdued but SO MUCH happier.
They brought her a popsicle and a sippy of water and she was a different kid.
Trying (unsuccessfully) to open her eyes...
Taking a much needed rest on the drive home.
Sadly, just a few minutes later, she threw up her whole popsicle. It was the only thing in her system and apparently even that was a little too much. Poor kid.
The first time we got her to open both her eyes. If you look closely, you can see how bloodshot and dilated her right eye is.
She's had some hard times since coming home but is doing really well. She forgets about the stitches in her eye and rubs it without thinking and then realizes how badly it hurts. We also had to do eye drops for the first 5 days following surgery and they sting SO badly! Sadie is REALLY good at taking medicine and she's never had a harder time than with these dang eye drops. We finished them yesterday and let her throw them away so she realized she's all done.
Just 24 hours after surgery. Her eye's still red and hard to open all the way, but look at the difference in this kid. So much happier!
Way to go Sadie! You did a great job!
p.s. I have to take a minute and say how incredibly impressed we were with Primary Children's in Riverton. They were SO fantastic! The have TONS of toys in every room (including a few XBox 360 consoles for the older kids), cars to ride in, movies to watch etc. They made her feel right at home for being in a hospital. They catered to our every need and even offered to put a "flavor" in her anesthetic mask while she fell asleep. If you do have to put your child through a surgery of any kind, I HIGHLY recommend them.
