Successful Cranial Vault Reconstruction Surgery

 

Quick update. Surgery went well. Everything went smoothly. She woke up kind of fussy, so they gave her a stronger sedative and she calmed down. She is not happy about all the stuff hooked up to her, though. She is starting to swell up and, apparently, it is usually at its worst the second day. They say her eyes will be pretty much swollen shut tomorrow. How do you think a 3 year old in an unfamiliar place is going to react to that? :) Good times.

Thank you so much for all of your prayers.

Kraig & Trish

She's in Surgery

Playing with Dad's i-phone

Getting ready to watch her favorite video

We arrived at 6:00 this morning.  I'm not sure I got any sleep last night.  I was just thinking about everything and praying for LiLi.  She's back in surgery now.  The nurse just told us that everything is going really well.  They are in the process of cutting her skull. There is no way I could be in the operating room.  Just hearing that makes me cringe.

We're in Dallas

We left Thursday evening for Dallas.  LiLi had appointments at the hospital all day on Friday.  We started at 9:30 and were there until 4:30.  She was great.  She was probably wondering why everyone was touching and measuring her head.

After the last appointment we headed down towards Houston to see Kraig's sister, Linda and niece, Mikayla.  LiLi had a great time down there playing with her aunt Linda and cousin Mikayla.  The weather was really nice, so we were able to play outside.  We walked to several parks and a couple lake in the area. It was so great to get outside.
Now, we're at the hotel in Dallas.  LiLi just went to sleep and we have the clocks set for 5am.  We need to be at the hospital at 6.  The surgery starts at 7:30am.  Please keep us all and the surgeons in your prayers.

Trisha

Medical Insurance Approval

"Day after day our God is reigning. He's never shaken. My hope is in the Lord. Time after time our God is faithful. Trustworthy Savior. My hope is in the Lord."

Those lyrics have been on my mind lately. This past year especially I've seen how faithful God has been to us. I just want to thank all of you who have been praying for us lately. We were able get insurance to cover LiLi's surgery. Since our surgeon is 'out of network', our insurance was only going to cover a very small portion of his charges. I was told by several people that we would need to hire an expert to write an appeal to BCBS to get them to cover the surgery. We were down to almost 2 weeks until surgery and I was pretty close to hiring someone until I got the news that BCBS and the surgeon's office had come to an agreement. I didn't really believe it until I saw it in writing. BCBS has agreed to cover 80% of the charges and the surgeon has agreed to write off the other 20%. I believe it is truly a miracle. We had a lot of friends, family and friends of friends praying and I know it was the reason the agreement was made. We are so relieved!

We leave for Dallas this Thursday. LiLi has quite a few appointments on Friday. Her surgery will be at 7:30, Monday, February 28th. If all goes well, she will be out of the hospital on Wednesday and we will come home on Friday, March 4th. Grandmas and Grandpas will watch the boys while we are gone.  Please continue to pray.

We had more snow, in fact a blizzard early February.  The snow stayed in the yard for a few weeks.  LiLi likes going out sledding and helping shovel.  Well, maybe not helping,  She actually moves the snow from the pile back on the driveway.

We celebrated Chinese New Year by going to a couple events here in KC.  One was a dance recital.  Two of LiLi's friends were in the recital.  It was so much fun to watch.

Andrew had has last basketball game on Saturday.  It was so much fun to watch him this year.  He has improved so much throughout the season.

LiLi will turn 3 on March 1st, while she is in the hospital. It makes me a little sad, but at least she's young enough that she doesn't really realize when her birthday is. We decided to go ahead an celebrate her birthday early. I attempted to make a panda cake.  It turned out fairly well.  LiLi loved seeing it and eating it.  2 families who went to China with us were able to come over and help us celebrate. It was so great to see them again. We all had a lot of fun. We are going to celebrate with the grandparents Wednesday evening.

We'll keep you updated on LiLi's progress after the surgery.

She loves to dress herself