Update on Paige

Today Paige went in for her third surgery so far. #2 was Wednesday. They had wanted to do her leg that day, but her blood was too thin. It's a fine line to walk - keeping the blood thick enough to prevent bleeding out, yet thin enough to prevent clots. So they ended up just working on her hand again. They had to put in some external cables to keep some bones in place.

So Surgery #3 was for Paige's leg. Take out the external fixator, pin the tibia and fibula back together, repair the MCL and ACL (which needed fixing after all). The surgeon came out and said that the surgery had gone better than he had hoped for.

However, when Paige started to come out of the anesthesia this afternoon, she woke up to the worst pain she's been in up to this point, which is saying a lot. She was in so much pain, they upped her meds. And when she was still thrashing in pain, they gave her a spinal block, which is basically an epidural.

It helped, but now the spinal block is wearing off, and she's in excruciating pain. She's in such terrible pain, she can't sleep. She just cries and thrashes, and tries to calm herself by listening to church hymns. They can't keep giving her spinal blocks, because there is still the risk of losing circulation to her leg, and consequently losing her leg. So she has to be able to feel her leg to know if it starts to go numb. It's breaking our hearts to watch someone we love so much hurt so badly.

I got someone to cover my shift at work tomorrow night so I can go down all day. Just sit and hold her hand. Sing to her if she wants me to. I'm hoping that just lending my presence will give her strength. I wish there was something else that I could do to help her. I don't think I've ever felt so helpless.

We're spreading the word for a community fast this coming Sunday, the 4th. Please, everyone fast and pray for Paige. Pray with us that she will be given the strength she needs to see this pain through. That she will be strong enough to get past the pain of the next few weeks and months.