Update on Mom

During the testing last night, the doctors discovered that her apendix was swelled to the size of a baseball. At that point, they weren't sure if she had a perforated bowel that was causing the apendix issues or if the apendix itself was the issue. They scheduled a scope for 11am this morning, anticipating that they would then go in and take out/fix whatever they found to be the issue.

My sister Heather and I went to the hospital this morning and stayed with my parents until they wheeled mom to surgery at 11:20am. One of the doctors let us know that if everything went well, the surgery should last about an hour. I went to work for an hour because our two head teacher needed to be gone today so I went in to help with transitions between classes. Dad and Heather waited in the waiting room.After the first hour, we were begining to wonder what was going on when one of the nurses called. They let dad know that it was, in fact, mom's appendix. It was so swelled and attached that it was challenging to remove but they were going to try to use the scope to get it out. About an hour later, dad received another phone call to let us know that the appendix was out and mom was in recovery.

While mom was still in recovery, the surgeon visited with us. I figured he might use some medical jargon but was a bit taken aback when his first and almost only words were, "It was bad."

They removed the appendix and think the infection was contained but are watching her very closely for signs of the infection spreading. She was in a lot of pain initially after surgery but by this evening, the pain medicine seemed to help cover most of the pain. She's really not in any shape for visitors yet but I'll head back up in the morning before work and check on her again. She'll be in the hospital at least three days, possibly longer.

Thanks to everyone for your prayers today! Mom and our whole family felt a sense of peace prior to surgery and we know that it came from being covered in prayer. Thank you!
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