1/4 - On the eleventh day of Christmas my true love gave to me...

...a complete skull. 

Well, the wait is finally over, and Sam is back in the room. Prior to his arrival, the neurosurgeon visited with us and told us how surgery went. They put in the drain which was successful in removing fluid. However, there was so much swelling past the opening in the cranium, it took a lot longer to remove the damaged tissue than originally anticipated. After they removed what they needed to, they replaced the portion of skull that was removed in the original surgery. He said that they will be keeping a close eye on everything via scans to see how Sam is progressing after the surgery. He alleviated one of my biggest fears, which was that his other organs would decide they'd had enough, and just give up doing their job. The surgeon said, he was "rock stable" the whole time. While the surgery went much longer than we anticipated, it went as well as it could have possibly gone. 

There is only one other thing I'll tell you about for now, because it is just that good. When they brought him back, they were bagging his trach instead of hooking him up to the ventilator. While they were working on setting up the machine in his room, the nurse in charge of the bag was not squeezing it enough in my opinion.  (This opinion was based on all of my vast medical training and watching ER for so many years.) She told me that she didn't need to squeeze it because he was...wait for it...breathing on his own. The breaths were not very deep, but they were good enough to not require support. Even though this was a temporary situation (they will keep him on the ventilator during recovery) this is an incredibly good sign, and we look forward to seeing this trend improve as he recuperates from surgery.

I have been receiving messages all day long from so many people that you have been praying for Sam, his medical team, and all of us. We are thankful for that, and for all of you. I know you all waited a long time for an update, and I'm also thankful for your patience! God has brought Sam through another critical juncture, and we cannot help but feel completely enveloped in his love. You are all the embodiment of that love, and we are grateful.

Today's picture is from this past fall. Jim and Sam would take the DART (train) every Monday for practice with the Children's Chorus of Greater Dallas. As a rule, Jim hates selfies, but this one completely melts my heart.