Surgery again, or One More for the Road

Mercy is scheduled for surgery this Friday to place a longer-term gastric tube. Since coming home, her ability to eat from a bottle has regressed. She relies on a nasogastric feeding tube for all of her nutrition. Unfortunately, she typically vomits her NG tube out between 3-5 times per day. The G-tube will provide a direct line to her stomach and allow her to develop eating skills, and it will help her trust us again when we try to feed her orally. Right now she cries whenever we try bottle or breastfeeding because she associates anything near her mouth with the pain of inserting the NG tube.

This decision was really difficult for us. Developmentally, allowing her head to move freely without a tube will only benefit her and her prospects of eating on her own. Something needed to change to give her a shot at normal development. Surgically, exposing her to another abdominal surgery when all systems are working well right now is a big risk. We’re terrified that we might upset her gastrointestinal house of cards.

Please pray this Friday if you’re able. It should be a short surgery and only require an overnight stay. Pray it all goes well!!

Generally, she’s doing great. She’s up to nearly 11 pounds, she loves being around her family, and she’s delightfully talkative.

Big news: Mercy is getting baptized on the 19th of May at 10 am!!! If you’re interested, here’s a link to our church’s YouTube channel where it’ll be live-streamed:

https://youtube.com/@gracepresbyterianchurch8361?si=3Pa2TSzcBUOhmsLa

There was a time early in her life when we thought Mercy might need to be baptized in the hospital. Praise God for His mercies,

that we get to celebrate and rejoice over our Mercy and that so many are rejoicing with us!!

Love to you all