The Morning of Sugery and Latest Updates

We arrived at the hospital at 6AM on Friday morning with one goal in mind; to spend as much time with Jacob as we could before we put him into the hands of the surgeons. We didn't know what our outcome would be, and if it was our last moments with him, we wanted to make them special.

As we were driving to the hospital we decided that we wanted to read some scripture with him and sing some songs with him to let him know that he is in the arms of the father! We were given a little children's bible and decided to use that for our time together. On the way, we were talking about which scriptures would be good to share with Jacob. We thought of "Be strong and couragous and do not be afraid," in Deuteronomy, also we thought of "For I know the plans I have for you.." from Jeremiah, then we thought about "Trust in the Lord with all your heart" from Proverbs. We realized none of these would work because the little Bible was only a New Testament. So as Jeff dropped me off and parked the car I asked God to show me what we should read to Jacob. I opened the little Bible and it opened to Matthew 5, the section about Ask, Seek, and Knock. It reads, "Ask and you shall receive, seek and you will find, knock and the door will be opened..." I thought that would fit well with the occasion, but I wanted another scripture just in case, so I closed the Bible and opened it again. Only this time it opened to Luke's version of the same scriptures, "Ask and you shall recieve, seek and you will find, knock and the door will be opened." My eyes filled with tears. This was definately what God wanted us to share with Jacob.

As we were in the room with Jacob we shared those scriptures, and sang "Be strong and courageous," and "Jesus Loves Me." We told Jacob that there are so many people asking God for his miracle, and that he needed to ask God too. We reminded Jacob of all the wonderful things he had already done in this life, all the people he had helped, all the events that he got to participate in, and reminded him that he is probably the only kid his age that could say he flew a plane with his uncle! Our nurse that morning came over with tears in her eyes and said that she felt burdened to pray with us. So, Jacob was prayed over by his nurse and us before we left him. It was a very special morning for the three of us.

The Surgery started around 9AM and lasted about 3 hours. It was the longest three hours of waiting we have ever had to do. They called us back into a quiet room where we met with the surgeon and Jacob's attending doctor. The news we receieved was not the best news, but not the worst news either. It was still hard news to receive. When the doctors moved Jacob's liver into his abdomen and began to patch him up, Jacob's liver did not respond well and had problems with blood exiting the liver. Once the doctors saw this, they placed the liver back into the chest and immediately the liver and his vitals improved. They tried three times to move the liver and each time Jacob's response was the same. In Jacob's best interest, the surgeons decided to back out of the surgery in order to redefine their plans and do another surgery later next week when they have learned more about why they encountered problems. So, Jacob still has a liver in his chest, and has to recover from a surgery that didn't correct his structural problems, and needs to do it again later.

Upon receiving this news, Jeff and I were obviously disappointed that it wasn't as easy of a "fix" as they had thought previously. It was not easy to digest, knowing that our son would have to fight for recovery, then fight again in the coming days. It's one of those moments where a parent wishes they could take any and all pain away from their child, but are helpless to do so. We knew that recovery would be tough and there was a chance that his little body would not be able to make that fight without the help of ECMO. We were in for a long night.