Waiting

I'm sitting in the surgery waiting room at the local children's hospital. It's hour 3 of the three- or four- or five-hour surgery that my son is undergoing. I'm writing because I don't know what else to do to calm my nerves. This isn't a live-saving or life-threatening surgery. But it's long. And he's completely anesthetized. And he's four.

A year ago, his nose started running. All the time. Clear, never cloudy unless he caught a cold. We thought it was spring allergies. And then maybe summer allergies? Are there winter allergies? Is he allergic to the cat? We took him to an allergist, all of us excited to finally figure out what was making his nose drip. I sat in the room as they placed the allergen test strips on his back, poked them into his skin while he laid on the table, distracted by Curious George. I waited anxiously during the several minutes for something to appear, and it did. A large red lump in the lower quadrant. Finally! When the allergist came in, I pointed to it. Look, I said. What's that one? He smiled and pointed at the lump. Ah yes, he said. It's the control. Everyone reacts. You son doesn't have any allergies. Isn't that great?

Still, his nose ran. We tried Claritin, Zyrtec, Flonase, Benedryl. Now paying more attention, we realized that his nose only ran from one nostril. I did some googling and completely freaked myself out. We asked for recommendations for an ENT and made an appointment.

The ENT we visited was not a pediatric ENT. She ordered a CT scan and disagreed with the radiologist's conclusion. She sent us to the specialist at the children's hospital, who ordered xrays and an MRI. She called a meeting with us and the fancy sinus surgeon from a nearby hospital. It's brain fluid. Specifically, cerebrospinal fluid or CSF. And it's leaking from his nose because he has a small hole in his skull, in his sinus cavity, and a little bit of brain membrane is hanging down. And it's leaking.

This, friends, is crazy. CRAZY.

So now, today, we're getting it fixed. Just twenty years ago every solution to this sort of problem involved a full cranial opening, a slice along the hairline to access the interior of the skull and patch the hole. Thankfully, today's procedure is all endoscopic through his nose. Little cameras and instruments stuck up toward his skull base, where the surgeon is plugging up the hole with a bit of fat harvested from his hip, and covering the whole deal with a bit of mucosa from the parts of his sinuses that they bust through and discard to make room. It's usually successful. He'll spend the night in this hospital, as will I, woken up every hour in the ICU by nurses who will check his vitals and make sure all is well. It's not a major surgery but it feels pretty major.

I'm sitting in the surgery waiting room at the local children's hospital. It's hour 3 of the three- or for- or five-hour surgery that my son is undergoing. I'm writing to calm my nerves.