Ava's heart surgery

She's like oh gosh mom leave me alone with the pics I'm tired :)

"my aunt loves me" I think aunt barbara got her this??
getting her ready for her ambulance ride
she zonked out..... sleepy girl

How's everyone doing? I'm ok. A little emotionally drained but other than that, we're hanging in there. I just wish I could take my little girls pain away from her. It really sucks to be so helpless. Tuesday day was a big day, but Wed. a even bigger one. Tuesday Ava got to go on her first big girl ride (i still need to get a pic) in an ambulance. I will get a picture of it as soon as I see it again. I had to load all of her stuff in the car which took about 5 trips. It was sad for me, I guess because I thought when it was time to load her stuff up that we would be going home not next store for heart surgery. They got her over here to the picu, got her iv'd up, and she slept most of the night. We had our first sleep over together :) My sweet girl, she didn't even fuss for a bottle and went over ten hours without one. She was supposed to go down for surgery about 7:30am. She made it down there (which was one of the hardest things as a parent to watch) but after about a half an hour or so was wheeled back up to her room. One of the other patients, (an 11 month old baby girl named Josephine) whom had heart surgery the previous day had some complications. They needed the surgeon right away so they had to put Avas off for a bit. Long story on this other little girl but she's not doing so well, so keep little Josephine and her family in your prayers!!!! Anyway about 10:00 or so they got started on my little Ms. Ava., which might I add is the strongest little angel in the whole world!!! :) About 2 we got a call saying she was back in her room, everything went well and we could see her in an hour. The surgeon said that the hole in her little heart "impressed him" It was a lot bigger than he expected I guess. He patched it up (no wires for a temp pace maker) and she should be good to go. After 5 long hours I got to see her. She didnt even, still doesnt, look like the same baby. It's the saddest thing. We've had a few setbacks overnight and early morning, but hopefully those will be behind us soon. Ava's lungs are full of fluid so they're giving her breathing treatments every three hours, suctioning her out, and keeping her on morphine and a med that basically paralizes her for a short time. They sent some of the fluid and secretions from her lungs to the lab to be tested for infection. She keeps getting better then will get worse again. They've had to suction and bag her quite a few times, but after a min. or so her heart rate comes back up and she's stable again. See what I mean about how strong she is :) My poor baby is soooooo swollen, which you'll see in her pics. The nurses are calling her lips angelina Jolie lips :) After her surgery her heart rate would jump up a bit, we turned her mobile on and it went back down. We knew she loved her mobile but its funny that even in the sleep state she's in, it still soothes her. Hmmmmm what else what else? There's been so much thats going on it's hard to relay it all back to everyone. Well I'm going to post a few pics and try to get some sleep. The most sleep at one time I'm getting are from my naps. The great thing about here at the picu vs the nicu is one of us can stay in the room with her all night. They also gave us a sleep room that we can go back and sleep in. I'll keep everyone posted. If I've missed any calls from anyone and haven't called you back, sorry. It's been a really long couple of days. Too bad we can't just skip a week, huh? Oh yeah as far as her getting out of the picu and going back to the nicu we're not super sure yet. The heart surgeons nurse practitioner said she'd wouldnt be surprised if we're still here monday. She's still on the vent to, so my guess is we'll be here at least till Wed.

she's so swollen, these are her after surgery pictures, this last one i just took a few min ago. the others are from last night.