Colorado Children's Hospital - Post-Op

Last night I started leaking fluid again. It was quite a bit, but I tried not to think too much of it - last time when it happened after the first fetal surgery was one of the hardest nights for me, and everything turned out to be fine. Vahe and his friend were able to come and give me a blessing last night (a special prayer for the sick in the Mormon faith) and I was overwhelmed with peace and reassurance after. So, while it is definitely our biggest concern right now, we are continuing to hope for the best and just doing everything we can on our part (bed rest aka torture) to allow for healing.

The doctor said that the amniotic fluid could be leaking from the new incision, but its likely that it actually came from the last - which opened back up once the uterus was full again. The uterus is actually not able to heal itself, rather, its walls are made up of two different layers that can shift in opposite directions. When the incisions in both layers shift away from each other, it will temporarily seal. But, he expects the extra fluid inside could have stretched the incisions back on top of each other.

Our ultrasound also showed that baby's bladder looks like it has healed. The little goob didn't even wait 24 hours after surgery to need another one again! Because the bladder was still leaking through the rupture, they could not place the shunt all the way through - right now it only goes from baby's belly to the amniotic sac. So, for now we will continue to watch and wait. Our surgeon thinks that since the bladder has ruptured twice before it is possible that it will just continue a cycle of filling and rupturing again on its weak spot. Baby would be ok in that situation, he will need surgery on his bladder at birth regardless, but it does continue to put a lot of pressure on his kidneys every time it fills. If it does heal all the way, or at least to the point where it can maintain fluid for another surgery - then we will be back under.

I hope that this shunt will tie us over for a few weeks. As much as I just want to go home, I really hate having these surgeries so close to one another. Especially when it comes to keeping baby cooking for as long as possible, having so much done in so little time is concerning to me, for sure. But we will continue to just take it one day at a time until we know the next step. I do hope that eventually we will have the opportunity to retry the stent because it is a more permanent solution, but only time will tell at this point.

We will go in on Monday and reassess from there. There is really no expectation of what we want to see with baby, because there are really so many variations of what could happen. Our biggest hope right now is that the fluid leakage stops, which I expect it to. Whether this happens before or after I go crazy from laying down all day is unknown. :)