Another Hospital... Another Surgery... Another Waiting Room...

I'm supposed to be working today. Cleaning my classroom, packing things away, finishing paperwork, etc... Instead I'm sitting at a hospital in Greensboro, NC, waiting for my son to come out of surgery. I found out about 4:00 yesterday afternoon that Jared would be having surgery today.  Jared is my third child, second son, my Winter baby (born in Dec. just 2 weeks after my 31st birthday) and an accident waiting to happen. No lie.

Hey,we've never been to THIS hospital! 

We have done *this* so many times with him. I tell everyone that we have ID passes to every hospital and ER up and down the East coast. Since Jared was a little fella, we've been frequenting hospitals for one injury or another--some health issue or another.  Even when we are on vacation, we somehow manage to end up at some kind of medical facility.  This is our dare devil child, no fear, "go big or go home" child, "Hey, Ya'll watch this!", sports playing, soccer loving, do everything with Zest and Gusto or don't do it at all -- kid. However, he does all these things with little thought of the consequences to his body or what the "end result" could be. When he plays soccer, he is very aggressive. Soccer is his passion in life so he plays BIG. Jared is no small boy and he is incredibly strong. His legs alone could stop a train. When he is playing, he is "all in."  We always said that if a ball were to roll out into oncoming traffic, he would feel it his job to go and get it despite the danger or the mere fact that it would be stupid to do such a thing. It's just who he is and this is one of the many reasons we love watching him play.

The surgery today is "exploratory in nature." Jared has been peeing blood for weeks now. He had this same issue last summer. Tests were done then and nothing was found as a *cause.* A couple of weeks before school was out this year, it started up again, but with more frequency. His soccer trainer discovered it again on a random urine test. Jared came home mid-May and since then has been to a urologist for more testing. I'm talking about CT scans, blood work, ultrasounds, you name it, they've tried it. He is still peeing blood. Something is wrong. There has to be a reason this is happening. So yesterday he had a follow up visit with the urologist and nothing had changed except now his blood pressure was too high (for him).  The previous visit it was also high. High blood pressure can damage one's kidneys. The doctor was concerned about this and the blood and he scheduled surgery for today.

It is out patient surgery but he has to be completely put to sleep. The surgery itself could take anywhere from 45 minutes to an hour. He is in surgery right now. I've said a lot of prayers. If nothing is found today, then Jared will be referred to a nephrologist (kidney specialist). If that happens, then something could be wrong with his kidneys. A urologist doesn't deal specifically with kidneys thus the reason to send to a specialist.  There is a possibility this could have occurred while playing soccer. Jared has been hit in the kidneys many times, some punches, elbows, kicks very severe. This could also be a result of one of his "don't think before I leap" moments... literally. During exam week, Jared and a bunch of buddies took a little hiking adventure to some cliffs, very high cliffs. Cliffs where stupid young people jump off and fall into the water below.  Well, like I mentioned, Jared doesn't just do the easy way, he has to "go big." He decided to do a Gainer off of this 3 story high cliff. He did the Gainer beautifully but the landing was really bad-like land flat on your back bad. He ended up with a concussion, a trip to the ER and when he hit the water, the impact to his back/kidneys was intense. So who knows?

OK, it's now 5:15pm, and we are STILL in the hospital. Jared is in Recovery and we are waiting for him to "pee." We can't leave until he does this. Surgery was over at 12:47 and I saw the doctor shortly after 1:00.  Dr. M said the surgery went well. (was longer than expected--he really looked around in there!) The only abnormal thing he saw was some redness on the bladder and some oozing. (and the oozing is blood). He thinks this could be the reason for the blood in the urine. He went ahead and took a sample for a biopsy. The results should be back in about 3 business days.  He could not scope the ureters b/c Jared's apparently are very narrow. He couldn't even get the scope through them, but he also added it was a very normal thing for a young male who is very physically fit. Jared has a lot of muscle mass (he's nothing but muscle) and Dr. M said muscle mass is also around the bladder/kidney area. He wasn't worried about the narrow ureters. He did put stents on both sides of his kidneys. I'm going to show you a picture of a "stent." It is nothing like I expected!! I was waaaay off base! ha  It's no wonder Jared is currently in a great deal of pain. Whoa!! I mean, like really.  I did ask the doctor if this could be caused from any sort of trauma. He said, "No. Definitely not."  The bottom line is this: If this biopsy comes back clean, then Jared will have to see a kidney specialist. Dr. M feels there is more blood than there should be and something very definitely is wrong to be causing all of this.  We just have to find out what it is. More than likely he will see someone from Wake Forest if it comes to that. Here is that "stent"... remember he has TWO!!

So here we sit, just waiting for the much anticipated "pee!"  Jared has had some pretty intense back pain due to the stents. It is a foreign object in his body, after all. It's going to hurt and be very uncomfortable. The unfortunate thing is, it will have to stay in there until his next appt with Dr. M and that could be 1-2 weeks away. :(  The nurse has given him some great pain meds and he is now "out cold" just snoozing away! I figured we would have been back home long ago, but that didn't happen, so we wait.  I'm getting pretty hungry. One doughnut for breakfast just doesn't cut it for an entire day!  I KNOW Jared has to be starved out of his gourd. He's had nothing since last night!!

Pain meds are working great! :o)

Let's continue to hope that this is just some freaky thing and it will go away. I'm going to believe it's nothing serious. I just have to believe it. He's going to be OK and continue being his Zesty Full On self.
(hopefully with just a little bit of forethought from here on out!)

C'mon, Bladder! Fill up so we can go home!!!

D~