I can Crawl

Click to watch Hannah crawl.

She's Back

11 days post op, nearly two weeks after surgery and Hannah finally slept through the night! I am so proud of her for fighting through something that the majority of babies never have to experience. It is also a relief as a mother because it makes me feel like it means her mouth is healing properly. On Monday we meet with the doctor to make sure. We have been so wrapped up in her surgery and recovery, that lately I have failed to update you on all the fun new things Hannah is doing.

For awhile now Hannah has been dancing. Every time music comes on whether it's on TV, her toy or the radio, she rocks back and forth. She also loves to point and wave. She points and waves at anything and everything. You know already that Hannah has been mobile for awhile by scooting, rolling and dragging her body around the room, but earlier this week she started crawling. A real (on all fours) crawl. And where does she go first? She loves the dvd cabinet. She knows how to open it and finds great joy and pulling out each movie one by one. She also loves to go after and get her hands on anything she knows she shouldn't touch (especially remote controls, cell phones, and the laptop cord). One of the biggest accomplishments lately was her saying a consonant sound when babbling. This isn't a big deal for most, but for a baby with cleft this is huge and just a few short days after surgery she babbled "nene" and "da." Unfortunately, she only did it once, but I know now she can produce those sounds. At 18 months she will get evaluated by a speech pathologist. Tim and I work with her everyday on sounds and we expect that by the time 9 more months roll around, she will pass with flying colors. If not, that's okay too I still think she is amazing.

Daddy's Still on the Blow Up Bed

This week went really fast...I can't believe we are one week out of surgery. Hannah's mouth looks great, but she is still struggling to get back to her normal self. This last week I have had many flashbacks of our first few weeks with Hannah. She still doesn't eat much mostly because I think the bottle irritates the stitches. She is taking about half of the amount of food that she is used to getting. During the day she is pretty good if you provide constant entertainment and distraction. Then night comes and so does my anxiety. Tim and I had no idea recovery would be this difficult. Even with pain medication she wakes up every few hours screaming all night long. In addition to this, she has to be held and will not sleep unless she is with me. I am guessing it's a combination of pain and hunger. I would say maybe the NoNo's make her uncomfortable, but Hannah has those baby's off in about 30 seconds flat. For the most part she is good about keeping things out of her mouth but every now and then in the middle of the night I see her sucking her thumb. If she is sleeping I am not stopping her. How much damage could she really do when she is asleep. I keep hoping one of these days we will wake up and everything will be back to normal, but right now I feel like we may never get sleep again. These are the same irrational thoughts all new mommies have and eventually they sleep and so will Hannah. At 4am when I'm on my 8 millionth round of "Hush Little Baby" I remind myself that she went through major surgery and I feel blessed to be laying next to her even if it means no sleep.

Home Sweet Home

Most of my readers know that Hannah came home yesterday after a two night stay at CHOC Hospital. Her cleft was repaired beautifully by Dr. Sundine. There are two open cuts down each side which will eventually fuse together on their own and a line down the center of her mouth with disolvable stitches. We arrived early Monday morning for the big event. Tim and I have had mixed emotions all week about her surgery. It is happy and exciting that we can finally put this issue to rest, but it is so scary as a mother to know your baby is going under the knife. I was also surprised how hard it hit me that my baby would look different. I know to all of you she looks the same, but to me, I knew I'd look in her mouth and it would be different than the baby I had at birth. I wasn't sure how I would deal with that. I know she was created beautifully and perfectly by God, but I also know that fixing her is for the best. I hope Hannah knows that in my eyes she has always and will always be perfect. The morning of the surgery, Hannah was happy and thought it was the best thing ever. She had a lot of attention from loved ones and even got to ride on a bus. Nurses brought in toys for her to play with and she was in heaven. Around 7:30 they gave her loopy juice which was sad but kind of funny. Sweet baby kept trying to clap. (PS. an update from the last post, they weighed and measured her before she went back and she has grown 3 inches in the last few days. Not really, we think the pediatrician measured wrong and she is really 29 inches). I hated having them take Hannah away from me and the waiting game was difficult. Tim says he will always remember that Hannah tried to pull the nurses mask off when they took her away. It made him smile and lightened the mood. After two hours the doctor came out and told me it went well. Thank God! Tim and I went back to recovery where she was very drugged, but looking good. I was really surprised that when she woke up and started crying she didn't even sound like herself. There was so much blood in her mouth and her throat was swollen from the breathing tube that she barked like a seal. They had to call the respiratory specialist over to help her. Ironically he had a four year old daughter named Hannah who was also born on 1-5. We stayed an hour there and were entertained by the man next to us waking up from his anesthesia. Hannah finally got to be wheeled over to her room at CHOC and was thankful for all her visitors. The first day she mostly rested and was on morphine every 4 hours. Day two her happy playful personality was back, but she still would not eat. Hannah had a roommate named Unch. He was a 10 month little boy who had a kidney removed and she liked watching Mickey Mouse Clubhouse with him. She spiked a 103 fever the first night and 101 the second night, but other than that vitals looked great. Hannah loved how the oxygen measure taped to her foot lit up like her glowworm and she played with it all night long. Mommy and Daddy didn't sleep much but we knew regardless of our accommodations, Hannah was much more uncomfortable and we wouldn't have chosen to be anywhere but with her. On day two, her IV started leaking and they said they were going to have to re-stab her because she still wasn't eating. I think Hannah heard and started eating just then. She still isn't eating much, but it's something. She also cut out the morphine and switched to Tylenol with codeine. Hannah misses having her paci at night time so she sleeps with mommy as her comfort. This means daddy is on the couch. She wears the NoNos to prevent putting things in her mouth, but has already learned to take them off. Three weeks of this should be interesting. I think she will get a little better each day. I am so proud of my sweet angel and she is stronger than I could ever be.

Hannah with the CHOC Bear


This is in the morning when she still thought it was a fun happy day


Pre OP


This face is what made me be strong


Recovering right after surgery, what amazing strength a little baby can demonstrate






Ouch


Hannah is smarter than the NoNos


All her special friends helped her recover

She's Shrinking

Hannah had her 9 month check up today a little early since next week is the big hole closure. We went to a new doctor who was recommended by Zane and Weston. It is such a small world. He looked at her paperwork from San Jose and said "oh I went to Medical school with Dr. Stemmle." Crazy. He was a nice man but we may try his other location because the office girls left something to be desired. I also think a pediatrician's office should be welcoming to little ones by having teddy bear wall paper, but this was a bit cold. I know I am very picky, but as you know I stop at nothing but perfection for Hannah. The main thing is that the doctor is good and we did really like him. He has another office location so that way we ditch the girls that need an attitude adjustment and keep the great doctor. She had to get one shot (the final Hep B) and did fabulous. Hannah currently weighs 18 lbs. 5 oz. which is 50% or dead average for her age/gender. Her head of course continues to be huge 46 cm which is 95%. It's amazing the child can sit up with a head that heavy :) But Hannah is shrinking. Okay not really, her height is just slowing down. She is 27 inches which is 25%. All along she has been around the 70%. Maybe she is going to be more like a Laura Tatum than a Nana Tatum after all. Not that you are short Auntie, you are just the right size :) Hannah is officially on the move. She has not yet mastered the on all fours crawl, but she gets from point A to point B by scooting, dragging, and rolling. The doctor said pretty soon we should expect to see her pull herself up from sitting to standing. He said all looked great! Next regular check up is at one year.

Stinker Face

Dr Knows Best

My Sweet Hannah Gracie, Some day when you are reading this and you think "why did my mommy make me wear those stupid NoNos? I'm sure I would have been a good listener and not put anything in my mouth" I hope you look at this picture and realize it was for your own good. Grandpa bought you your very first pumpkin which you love because it's just your size, but this is your favorite thing to do with it...

Pre-Op

Fun trivia question for the day: What do Peyton Manning (Colts NFL quarterback), Tutankhamen (Egyptian pharaoh), Tom Brokaw (Journalist), Tad Lincoln (President’s son), and Hannah Grace Tatum all have in common? You guessed it! They were all born with cleft palates and in two short weeks Hannah’s will be repaired.

Today we had Hannah’s pre-op appointment with her plastic surgeon. I can’t believe the surgery is here. I figured I would educate a little in case you were interested.

What is a Cleft Palate? A cleft palate is the most common birth defect in the United States occurring in roughly 1 out of every 700 births. Around the 12th week of pregnancy there is a failure in facial development. In typical babies, the skull palates fuse together creating the roof of the mouth. In a cleft baby, it fuses only partly resulting in a gap. In other words, Hannah has a big hole in her mouth that opens up into her nasal passage and ear canal. It can be a result of genetic or environmental factors. Most babies with cleft (about 70%) also have cleft lip. These are the kids you see on the TV commercials.

How is it repaired? Cleft palate is completely fixable! The skin/bone tissue around the cleft is stretched and stitched together. They do not use artificial material or skin graphing. The dr. tries his best to form a uvula but it all depends on how much they can stretch. The important thing is to close the hole, a uvula really serves no function.

Why is it repaired? Closing the hole facilitates feeding, allows for the sucking reflex to work properly, and prevents hearing loss. A cleft palate results in air rushing out the nose during speech. That’s why kids with cleft can sound nasally. This makes speaking difficult and unintelligible. Research shows that the earlier the cleft is repaired the better a child’s speech will be.

So now that you know all about clefts, keep our little one in your prayers. She is strong, brave and will do just fine. The doctor has done this procedure a million times.

Hannah's Cleft