An early Christmas present

First and foremost....to anybody that follows my blog (is there anybody out there reading this?) I must apologize for being the "absent blogger".  I think about my blog, even pretty much have everything I want to say in my head ready to go but when it comes down to sitting down to actually type it out I'm terrible.  Again, I will remind you of my very first post in which I disclaimed that I will attempt this whole blogging thing :)

As you can remember (the day is still extremely vivid in my head) when our baby boy was still just 6 weeks old, he underwent a procedure for an enlarged kidney that he was diagnosed with while I was pregnant.  I won't go into details as you can read about it on previous posts....but it was a very hard day watching my tiny, delicate baby being wheeled off into an operating room.  At the time of his surgery we were told that we wouldn't know the results for a few months.  NOT what we wanted to hear but Enrique and I tried our hardest to stay positive and just continue to spoil Nicolas rotten.  Well, our follow-up appointment was Wednesday, November 30th which meant another day of testing at Children's hospital.

The couple of weeks leading up to this day I was a nervous wreck, although I think I kept my cool pretty well.  Going back to work, being in school, starting daycare and of course most important of all, spending time with Nicolas kept me quite busy and didn't leave me much time to constantly think about the possibility that he might not be ok.  I actually had convinced myself (I think) that there was no way my precious baby could have anything wrong with him.  How could such a happy baby have anything wrong with him?!  Well, as the day got closer, I started realizing that we would have to endure another day of watching our poor baby be poked, prodded and in pain.

We arrived at Children's, both Enrique and I were extremely nervous of what was to come and neither one of us could take our eyes off of Nicolas.  Of course, our perfect little angel baby was just sitting in the waiting room with us, talking away, smiling having a good old time.....

Surrounded by toys smiling away in the waiting room

We were called back and told the ultrasound would be first, so that was a relief as we knew the ultrasound wouldn't be bad (as long as Nicolas didn't decide he wanted to be a wiggle worm).  Like a champ, Nicolas just laid on the hospital bed as the tech rubbed jelly on his belly and performed the ultrasound.  She was shocked at how good he was...he didn't even move the entire time except to flash the ultrasound tech the occasional flirtatious smile.

Such a brave boy!  Laying perfectly still so the tech could
get all of the pictures she needed

After the ultrasound, Enrique and I started getting really nervous as we knew the next test would be so hard for Nicolas and torture for us to watch.  I sat in the waiting room and I must have given Nicolas about a thousand kisses before we were called back.

"Mommy sure is kissing and hugging me a lot, what's up with that?!"

We were called back and the tech asked us a little bit about Nicolas's history.  Isn't it sad that our 3 1/2 month old (at that time) already has a "medical history".  She asked us if we knew about the test to which we responded "Yes, we know its an hour long."  To our delight she informed us that it would only take 20-30 minutes tops....I think we both took a breath for the first time since walking into the room at that moment.  Although finding out it would be shorter was a tiny relief, we still knew this was going to be so hard to see.  We had to get Nicolas undressed and I think I was moving in slow motion at this point (trying to stall).  Enrique and I got strapped into our protective vests and then we each gave Nicolas one last kiss before having to strap him down.  At first, just his feet were strapped down and he was fine with it.....

"What's all the fuss about Mommy and Daddy, I'm fine"

Then, the tech started grabbing Nicolas's teeny tiny arms and pulling them up over his head.  I looked at Enrique with wide eyes and I could tell he was a little panicked too as we watched them tug our baby boy's arms and strap them down so tight.  Now, as I have posted in just about every blog, Nicolas does not ever cry.  On this day, our baby cried.  Poor Nicolas was crying so hard when he was strapped in that he was gasping for air, it was the saddest thing to see.  I have never felt so helpless as I stood there rubbing what little parts of his head I had access to, knowing he would have to be uncomfortable for a full half hour and I could do absolutely nothing about it.  I could feel the knot building up in my throat and I knew I wasn't going to be able to hold it in so I quickly let a few tears build up in my eyes, my lower lip started trembling and I allowed myself to cry for just a minute or two.  I glanced over at Enrique but I couldn't look him in the eyes because I knew I would lose it if allowed myself to.  I could tell that he was in just as much agony as me.  We both rubbed our baby boy as he laid there screaming and crying and just waiting for his mommy or daddy to rescue him.  I have never felt such a strong urge to scream "THAT'S ENOUGH" and rip my baby out of the machine and just hold him in my arms....but I didn't.  I knew if we couldn't get the images the doctor needed that they would have to put Nicolas to sleep which I obviously did not want.  Here are some very, very sad pictures of Nicolas getting tested

My poor baby

His tiny little hands strapped above his head

Mommy trying to comfort him

Both mommy and daddy rubbing his head

The test ended up only taking about 20 minutes but when your baby is crying for 20 minutes straight and there is nothing you can do to help, 20 minutes seems like an eternity.  As soon as the testing was over we were able to swoop Nicolas up and hug and kiss on him until he stopped crying.  The tech told us that she didn't see any re-flux in his kidney which was a HUGE relief, but of course, we had to get the "official" report from the doctor.  As soon as we got home, I sent the doctor a text to let him know the testing was done.  We are fortunate enough to have found a WONDERFUL pediatric urologist who gave us his cell phone number even before Nicolas was born and encouraged us to call him anytime throughout all of this.  Rather than making us wait until the next day, within five minute he called us and gave us the best news of our lives.....Nicolas's kidney looked "shockingly well."  The exact words were "I am shocked at how good it looks compared to what we started with."

NICOLAS DOESN'T HAVE TO HAVE ANYMORE SURGERY!!!!!!  I have never felt so relieved in my entire life.  As soon as I got off the phone with the doctor I grabbed Nicolas from Enrique and squeezed him so tightly and cried tears of joy.  Then, Enrique, Nicolas and I had a big family hug.  It was such a great moment to know that we had a beautiful, happy, HEALTHY boy.  We are truly blessed and so thankful that god heard our prayers.  Thank you to all of our family and friends who prayed for Nicolas's recovery, it worked!

We are so happy that we are going to have the best holiday season of our lives with the most precious baby boy in the world!  

Such a long, torturous day, but in the end, it all worked out.  Nicolas healed after surgery, we can put this behind us and go back to what we do best....spoiling the best thing that has ever happened to us