Tomorrow ... 8am sharp.

My little Mackie gets his ear surgery in the morning. I have been a nervous wreck all day. One of the moms at the gym today said she will be praying for strength for Mackenzie and courage for me and Marty. And that is exactly what I needed to hear. Thanks Kathryn! And thank you to everyone else who has sent such kind words and well wishes. The surgery starts at 8am and will last anywhere from 2-4 hours. I will give an update as soon as I can.

Here is a layout I created a couple of days ago to try to put some of the feelings I was having into a layout. The three tacks in a row form 'dot, dot, dot' which means I Love You.

I thought this Winnie the Pooh quote was perfect:

"If the person you are talking to doesn't appear to be listening, be patient. It may simply be that he has a small piece of fluff in his ear."

Journaling reads: Just look at this cutie! Mackenzie and I were at Pizza Hut. I let him choose the restaurant. We had just come from Cook Children’s Hospital in Fort Worth where he had a CAT scan that confirmed there is a cholesteatoma in Mackenzie’s right ear. It is a small growth in his middle ear caused by recurrent ear infections over the years. Luckily the doctor caught it while it is still small and has not caused any permanent damage. However, this small growth is the reason for a big operation. On March 6th, Mackenzie is going to have his first of two surgeries. This one is called a Mastoidectomy and basically involves drilling through the mastoid bone into the inner ear. This will damage the mastoid bone and the doctor will have to remove one or more of the ossicles in Mackenzie’s ear to get to the cholesteatoma. After the surgery, Mackenzie will have significant hearing loss in his right ear. This will be corrected with a second surgery in 6-12 months. In the second surgery, the doctor will check to make sure the cholesteatoma is 100% gone and then begin reconstruction of the mastoid bone. He will either use Mackenzie’s own bone or a prosthesis. Of course there are many risks with this type of surgery, but the risk of not doing the surgery is far greater. All of these medical terms above were unknown to me about a month ago. It’s amazing how much you learn when something like this affects your child. We are lucky that this is not more serious than it is but it is still hard not to worry. Mackenzie means the world to us and we just want to do whatever we have to do to keep him healthy. ~Robyn 2.27.2007

Credits: Paper by Michelle Coleman (Color Happy paper set), Tea stain overlay and happy border by Nancie Rowe-Janitz. Date stamp: Amber Clegg. Frame Denise Docherty. Alpha, tacks and staples - Iron Orchid Designs. All from Scrap Artist. Ear diagram and Pooh Bear images from the Internet. Fonts are Antique Type (Hope Wallace) and Century Gothic. Created in Photoshop CS2.