TMI - be forewarned

In less than 72 hours, we will be home from surgery, God willing.  We are scheduled for Aiden's surgery on Thursday morning.  Many people have asked me what all will be going on, so if you are delicate, please don't read on...

Aiden has a condition called Scrotal Hypospadias.   It is where the opening where the urine would pass is not located on the tip of the penis like usual.  It is down where the penile shaft meets the scrotum.  It is considered to be a severe case of hypospadius.  He also has "abnormal genitalia" where the scrotal sack is actually attached to the penis on one side and the testicular area is two distinct sacs instead of one.

So, the surgery that Aiden is going to have is anticipated to be between 5 and 6 hours and he will have 4 (maybe 5 or 6) procedures done.  First, they will release the penis from the scrotal sack.  At that point, they will do a circumcision and use as much of that skin as possible to wrap around the shaft where there is no skin from the release (that is #2 procedure).  At that point, if there is not enough skin from the circumcision (which they don't think there will be), Aiden will have a skin graft taken from the cheeks inside his mouth (#3).  They will then repair the penile shaft and then move the scrotal sac where it needs to be and plastic surgery it enough to make it as normal as possible (#4).  Finally, they will take a catheter and urethra stent and punch a hole in the top of the penis and run the line into his bladder to repair that (#5) so he can urinate properly.  If they have had to take skin from his mouth, they will place an NG tube (feeding tube) through his nose so we don't delay the healing of the cheeks.  (#6).  WHEW!  While they are messing around in that area, his original surgeon from his previous surgeries wants to open the testicular sac to check on the testicle that was damaged during the hernia episode (see the very first post on this blog...).

The recovery will be something like this:  Optimally, this will all be done in one surgery and out-patient (Yikes...).  He will come home with a catheter and possibly an NG tube.  He will have between 180 and 360 stitches and be swollen horribly.  He will have the catheter for between 1 week to 6 weeks for that to heal.  (Think about getting ears pierced... you have to leave the earrings in place for the hole to heal so it stays open... Same concept.)  The urologist who is the US expert on this will be doing the surgery.  He warned me that the genital area will not look normal for about 5 years.  After this repair, Aiden will be fully functional like any other male.

He will be on Tylenol and morphine for as long as he needs it.  Poor bug.  He won't even be able to enjoy his favorite bubble bath for 8 weeks.

So, I guess I would just ask that all of you will pray for Mister and have him in your thoughts come Thursday morning.  Love you all and thanks for your love.