Repair the repair of TAPVD

Can’t believe I’m writing this entry during CNY. This entire event is like our worst nightmare coming true.

Noah was admitted to the hospital again and just had another surgery done on the 26th of Jan.

Things happened so quickly we hardly have the time to digest what’s going on. We just followed doctors instruction and slowly trying to know more about his condition.

On the 22nd of Jan,  I brought Noah to the PD to check on his appetite issue.  He haven’t been drinking much lately. In the past, he could finish up 70ml within minutes but now he takes up to an hour and most of the time have left overs too.

That day we went down to see Dr YY Yip without making appointment thinking that walk in is possible but coincidentally he was not in clinic. We ended up seeing Dr William Yip since we are already there and not wanting to make a wasted trip.

Dr William Yip is a cardio pediatrician and was very interested in Noah’s condition. He is not liking what he heard from Noah’s heart so he suggested on doing an echo test.

Results of the echo test is not too positive. But i could hardly understand what’s wrong with it and Dr William Yip says that he will call Dr Shankar to discuss while “things can wait”.

It took Dr William Yip 2 days before passing all the info to Dr Shankar.  I’ve no idea what took him so long but Dr Shankar was obviously not impressed by him and suggest that we should do another echo test with Dr KY Wong.

That was a Saturday and before we received the phone call from Dr Shankar, Dennis and I were planning to bring Noah out for a nice brunch. So instead of a happy family day out, we ended up at Dr Wong clinic within 30 minutes after the call.

The look on Dr Wong’s face during the echo test gave me cold feet. The words that he said to us almost made me faint. Noah’s heart isn’t looking good and he need a surgery to correct it.

Basically the joint they made in Noah’s heart is growing scar tissue and it’s obstructing the blood flow. We didn’t realise it was SO serious that a surgery is needed immediately. He was already not breathing normally and blood was hardly flowing to his limps hence they had a hard time finding the pulse on his hands. (instead of inserting the IA line in his hand,  they ended up inserting it to his leg. :()

I wish it was April fool so all these will be a joke. But no. We have to go thru the same pain we went thru just 2 months ago.

After leaving Dr Wong’s clinic, we went to Dr Shankar’s to discuss what has to be done. He suggest to admit Noah immediately to NUH and get the surgery done ASAP.

We waited at the clinic to make sure there is a bed at nuh waiting, all doctors are ready to take over the case before we drove to NUH. All these while there is only one question on my head. “Why? Why our Noah again?”

I remember the scene vividly where I lay Noah down on the bed in A&E. He was sucking on his pacifier vigorously, looking at me with his soulful eyes while I’m tearing. He seems to be asking, why mom? What’s wrong?  Why are you crying?

I was asked to hop onto the bed and carry Noah in my arms while they wheel us together to the PICU. I can’t let go of my sight from Noah. His eyes are the most talkative ones I’ve seen.  His look told me he trusted me while lying in my arms. He know I will protect him no matter what happens.

“But I’m sorry Noah.  Mommy has to let you go thru the pain once again. You’ve done nothing wrong. Why can’t god let me suffer in place of you instead?”

The doctor was amused when he filled up the surgery consent form with the surgery name “Repair the repair of TAPVD. But clearly we are not.

The surgery was scheduled to be done on the next day. We were told every redo of a surgery is harder than the previous one so it will take a longer time.

They were right. The surgery took 6 hours to complete compared to the previous one which lasted only for 4 hours. That 6 hours seems like eternity for us.  We waited in the waiting lounge outside the operation theatre staring at the status update screen hoping for it to be over soon.

The scenes of seeing Noah wheeling in and out of the OT are equally heart breaking. No parents deserves to go through what we went through. No baby should go through this kind of pain like my baby too.

Dennis and I were both exhausted. We have been worrying non stop, missing Noah non stop. My poor husband even placed one of Noah’s worn outfit in between us so we can smell it before we go to sleep at night.

Everyday we spent all our time in the hospital just to look at him. It felt like déjà vu all over again. The first few days was horrible because Noah is in pain and all I can do is just cry and cry. There were even moments where I have suicidal thoughts because I’m so stressed out. The decreasing of my breast milk supply doesn’t help either. I felt suffocated most of the time and I can’t stop crying.

Noah is really our champion. No matter how difficult and how much pain he went through, he fought hard. All I can do now is to provide him with love and EBM.

I can’t imagine what will happen if that day we manage to see Dr YY Yip. As a general PD, he would have thought that Noah’s loss of appetite is like “one of those days” where babies eat lesser and nothing major. The next appointment for his heart scan was actually scheduled in March. And by then it will probably be too late… I guess everything happened for a reason…

Please god let Noah be well again soon and no more pain for him. He had enough already and I will bear all his pain from now on I promise.