Coming down off the wall

Today Natalie's actual surgeon saw her for the first time since the surgery.  I told him that Tom and I were not happy with what had happened with the surgery site opening up.  He calmed me down a bit, so I climbed down off the wall that I was on, completely upset about the results.

He said that it does happen that g-tube stomas come open after surgery, and the part that opened for Natalie was just the epidermis...all the other layers inside had already healed.  He said the first five days after surgery are the most tenuous, when it's a real problem if something breaks open.  Natalie made it to 10 days after surgery before her skin popped open (which looked really terrible to us!) so he's certain that everything is well healed inside.  He's also happy with the way the wound looks.

I asked if we had to start the 2 weeks of no activity over again after the pop open, and he said, no, it's been 2 weeks since her surgery, so she can have normal activity.  I'm still going to limit her activities for another week (no swinging on her belly), but we will send her to school tomorrow, and we might go to a playground this weekend and see how she does.

Here's Tom's new invention for giving the children a bath in a hurry...all at once, no dirt on hands or feet...or anywhere else!