3rd surgery update

Benjamin made it thru surgery fine. His hernia was VERY large. In fact, there was not much diaphragm to work with, but there was enough to sew in the patch. Dr. Saito said she has done 15-20 of these surgeries and Benjamins is either the largest or second largest she's actually repaired. (Her partners have dealt with hernias this size though). Benjamins liver and spleen are also quite enlarged, so when attempting to put the abdominal contents back into the abdomen, a patch was required there (on the outside) also. Basically his incision is at least 6 inches across his abdomen, so pretty much across his entire belly, with a patch that is in the shape of an eye over it to allow for the abdominal contents to be covered up. The plan is to slowly close this patched area every couple days until it is fully closed. He also has 2 drains in his abdomen to allow any extra fluid a way to come out. His art line that was placed during surgery is already not working, so they attempted another one, but it was unsuccessful. They will be attempting another one tonight so they can draw his blood from it and monitor his blood pressure. His oxygenation is the range they want it to be and his carbon dioxide level is slowly coming down. His heart rate is the highest we've seen it yet and they are working on ways to try to bring this down. We have been told to expect him to become quite puffy in the next few days and that things are going to be rough for a bit until we can hopefully get him to calm down and settle back in to his comfort zone. He will continue to needs lots of prayers and loving....thanks for continuing to keep him in prayer.