Monday, March 15th, 2010

Yesterday afternoon I fell against the entertainment center while playing around and now have quite the scratches on my nose - my parents figure in a few short days no one will even notice once I have the large scars down my cheeks from the jaw distraction surgery!

Unfortunately my night nurse called in sick last night so Daddy stayed up with me. It was one of my worst nights in a long time with lots of coughing and neither of us got any sleep. My parents had planned to leave for Palo Alto in the early afternoon but before doing so Mommy got on the phone to see if anyone really thought surgery would happen tomorrow. First she started with the surgeon's office and his medical assistant instructed my parents to plan on showing up tomorrow morning as planned. Mommy wasn't happy with that answer so she then called and left a message for the operative nurse anesthetist who was on call. As the day passed, though, it became clear that the nurse was not going to return the call. Once again, Mommy called the surgeon's office and once again was told that we should still plan on showing up for surgery and letting the anesthesiologist decide in the morning whether to call off surgery or not. Now my parents have been through this a few times before, despite what the surgeon's office was telling them they knew an anesthesiologist was never going to move forward with surgery. However, now that the surgeon is in private practice they had to sign a form that if my parents cancelled surgery less than 48 hours before surgery they would still be responsible for the surgery fees. If the surgeon cancelled surgery due to my illness then that was fine but my parents couldn't cancel the surgery themselves so they knew they were stuck. So after Mommy dropped the dogs off for boarding at Camp Bow Bow my parents got me and all my stuff loaded up and off we went. Halfway to Palo Alto the nurse from the anesthesiology department called my parents for the standard night before surgery call. Once again, Mommy explained the coughing and vomiting and as you might have already guessed the nurse said to still plan on showing up in the morning at 6 am for check in.

I slept most of the ride down and I needed a few hours to burn off some energy in the hotel before my bath and bed time. For the first time, I slept in bed with both of my parents. Let's just say it was not a good night's sleep for anyone but we all enjoyed falling asleep together for the first time.

Peyton Nicole Smith