Zac's appendix adventure

Who knows when Zac's appendix burst -- it could have been as early as Wednesday -- but what appeared to be a garden-variety stomach bug escalated into enough pain that Jordan took him to the ER at 5am Friday morning. A cat scan showed a lot of fluid in his abdomen, so they operated through a 6-inch vertical incision just below his navel. There was goo all over his innards, so they removed what was left of the appendix and all the yuck they could find. They left the incision open so that they can monitor it for infection for a few days before they tape or stitch it shut.

Friday night night, Zac had every known tube and wire attached to him. The spinal block wore off at about midnight and they gave him a morphine machine not unlike the one that my mom had when she was dying of cancer. It doesn't drip though -- he can push a button to get a small dose, and the machine won't give another dose for 6 minutes. He slept most of the night and today, although the nurses have marched him around the halls a few times, and he has to suck on a plastic gadget 10 times once an hour to get air deep into his lungs.

He can't eat or drink anything -- not even water -- until his digestion shows signs of restarting. He's got a tube up his nose and down into his stomach to drain whatever might be in there, because otherwise he'll throw it up. Now we know that stomach bile looks exactly like pond scum. He's got saline with glucose dripping into him, along with two broad spectrum antibiotics that we hope will knock off the appendix detritus.

Zac is pretty limp and uncomfortable, and talking is hard with the nose tube, so we'll see when he can talk on the phone or have visitors. We've been taking turns hanging out with him, and the nurses set up a fold-out chair so one of us can sleep in the room. (Our local hospital is a pretty excellent place to go through an experience like this.) The doctor is talking about a 3-5 day hospital stay. Until his guts heal enough that they can tape or sew the incision closed, and until he starts be able to digest anything, he's not going anywhere.