A child in surgery

Not many groupings of words can bring more anxiety to a parent's heart than those. A child in surgery. But that's where we were yesterday as we waited for our son who was at Children's Memorial Hospital having a cataract removed from his right eye.

On a list of "serious" surgeries, I'd guess that this one might wouldn't qualify. In the days leading up to the surgery, I was confident in the doctor, didn't have much fear, knew it was fairly routine, but I couldn't help but get more nervous and anxious as we sat there waiting for the doctors and nurses to wheel our 6-year-old away. The surgeon talked to us beforehand and explained what would happen. We knew he'd have to have glasses. We knew that by taking out the cataract, she'd put in a new lens in his eye which would mean he'd lose the ability to see up close, thereby needing bifocals. And yet when she started talking about the slim possibility of things like a detached retina, I immediately thought, Oh, God, our son is going to be blind, isn't he? Ethan was taking it all in stride. A social worker showed him pictures of what he could expect. He listened to his own heart with a stethoscope. He watched PBS Kids and a bit of a Harry Potter movie, which just happened to be on one of the channels. As the anesthesiologist came and said it was time to go, we said a quick prayer together and they took him away.

We waited in the surgical waiting room (I could put up with the cell phones going off left and right, but there was a kid who was playing an unplugged video game for a good half-hour that drove me to the brink of bonkers-ness) and a little more than two hours later, the surgeon came in and told us every thing went fine and we could go see him in a few minutes. I'm not sure if there are more sobering places in this world than post-op rooms in children's hospitals. Ethan was sprawled out, still sleeping, but he woke up just a couple minutes after we arrived and that was the start of a couple hours of heartbreaking cries of "My eye is bothering me so much!" It's a helpless feeling to want to do anything--anything!--to ease your child's suffering, while knowing that time is about the only prescription. Time and a little Tylenol.

We did our best to soothe him, caress his hair, hold his hand, talk about all the people who were thinking of him and it did some good and we thought he was OK but then he'd cry some more, all while saying the same thing over and over. My eye is bothering me...so much! Eventually he was able to be distracted by the TV and apple juice, but little did we know that the biggest palliative would arrive later that afternoon.

His big sister.

It was amazing. I think what Anne and I did certainly helped but watching Caroline dote on him, say just the right things, and distract him from the discomfort was a marvel. He did pretty well after we got home, but every once in a while he'd start crying from the pain and Caroline would be there to do just the right thing. The picture above sums it all up. I realize I'm on the verge of overstating our children's goodness, but I don't mind bragging when our kids display remarkable courage and compassion. I really don't know when I was more proud of both of them.

Ethan goes back in today to have the surgeon take a look at his eye and he may not have to wear as elaborate of a patch from here on out (though he has a birthday party later today and I wouldn't put it past him or blame him to want to show off his badge of honor). There will be a multitude of drops we (mostly Anne) will have to put in his eye over the next several weeks and then in mid-August we do it all again on the left eye, but hopefully when the healing is complete, he'll be able to see amazing colors and clarity of shapes like never before. That will be a pretty remarkable gift.