We (Nick, Norah, and I) spent the last two days at the hospital, and we are spent tonight. We actually drove over to Cedar Rapids Sunday night. We stayed with my aunt MJ so we wouldn't have to drive so far and be up so early yesterday.
Norah's first appointment was a renal ultrasound. Norah did great for that one. Then, we headed to urology. We went to the adult clinic as that's where they do their surgeries. Norah was pretty brave as we got her prepped and in her gown. She called it her doggy princess gown. I got to go back with her to the ER and held her as they put her out for the cystoscopy. She cried but it was fast and I was glad I could be with her. Nick and I waited in a room for a little over an hour and Dr. Storm came to talk to us. She did fine but her right ureter still looks worse than the left. Both are slow to drain but the right is really off. The left is dilated but the right looks kind of like a snake and doesn't at all take the most direct route to her bladder. The left isn't totally direct, but much better than the right. He doesn't want to see her left take over for the right though.
We then went to the waiting room until we could go up to her in pediatric recovery. She was fine until she saw us and then the tears started flowing. Such a brave sweetie holding it together until she saw us.
The last test yesterday was urodynamic testing. The worst part of this is needing a catheter, but they put that in while she was sleeping, so it wasn't awful. She mostly cooperated for this but didn't love it by any stretch. The techs let her pick out a bear after and we headed to inpatient.
Dr. Storm came to Norah's room last night to say that her bladder function looked good in testing.
We were in a shared room but didn't have to share much of the time. Norah did really well being mostly confined to her room as she had an IV so they could push fluids through. A dance marathon volunteer played with her for over an hour which was a nice break for Norah and for us. The Child Life Specialists are pretty great too, they did a BINGO game over the televisions. Norah helped me color in the boxes and won a Doc McStuffins doll, which Norah LOVES. Nick also took her to craft night with them last night and we did music time this morning. Nice little breaks from the monotony of staying in the hospital!
Today at 1 Norah had a repeat renal u/s to see what things looked like with fluids pushed and a catheter in place.
With all the tests, they determined that Norah's bladder seems to be doing it's part so it seems that there is some sort of blockage between her ureters and her bladder, so we will return for a bilateral ureteral reimplant surgery. He will detach, shorten, and reattach her ureters. Norah may need stents but that will be a day of decision. We will stay at least one night in the hospital, but it could be two and we will have several follow-ups.
We don't have it scheduled but he thought he was booked through late August or early September. I will call this week and schedule.
I am glad we have answers, but, of course, I wish we didn't have to wait so long. The start of the school year isn't great since it's nuts for teachers anyway, plus Wes will be starting kindergarten to complicate things. We will figure it out, though.
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