{Photos are a mixture of Instagram photos and photos taken on my Canon 5D}

Mordecai was born missing several of his fingers and toes due to amniotic band syndrome. It’s not something I mention very often simply because it really doesn’t affect our daily lives. Mordecai has already had surgery on his hand twice: first when he was  a year and a half old, and once again about a year later. The first surgery removed a band that was still attached and cut into space between Mordecai’s thumb and index finger, to give him more range of motion. The second surgery widened that space even more.

This is what Mordecai’s hand looked like pre-surgery on Friday morning. You can see his thumb is still somewhat tucked under his hand and he has an odd-shaped nail on his middle finger. The tip of Mordecai’s middle finger bends over and the nail causes him pain as it grows. Yesterday’s surgery was to amputate the tip of the middle finger and do a nail ablation so the fingernail will be gone once and for all.

Mordecai was tired and nervous. We had to leave the house at 6 am and Mordecai normally sleeps until eight or later.

Here Mordecai is nervous, drugged and tired. He actually dozed off before the nurse came to take him back. When she asked his full name he could barely even answer her and he couldn’t tell her his birthday.

It’s strange, every time I’ve had a child have surgery up here in Bellingham, they give them medicine to calm and relax them before surgery. Down at Seattle Children’s they haven’t done that…we just have to wait around with a screaming miserable baby…

Mordecai was taken back at about 7:35 and done at 8:30. I was taken back into the recovery room to see him at 9:00.

When Mordecai awoke from surgery he was in a lot of pain- from his IV! Once he was able to drink some apple juice and keep it down they removed it and he was much happier.

Well, as happy as you can be after you awake from a general anesthesia post-surgery.

Mordecai spent the rest of the day watching movies (doctor’s orders to lay low) and eating snacks.

I haven’t seen his hand yet since it’s bandaged. We are supposed to try to keep the dressing on for two weeks- until his post-sugery follow-up. I’ll post more photos after that.