Surgery Day. (Continuous Updates)

Good Morning!

10:30 am - Arrived at hospital.  John's mom and dad followed him and the nurse into the back for prep. They'll get him in a gown and his IV in.  We'll see him shortly before his 12:30pm surgery.

**Pray for peace in John's mind and spirit.  Pray that God continually whispers scripture into his ears while he's awake and asleep.  Pray for friends and family in the waiting room.; for patience and endurance.**

Wait for the Lord;
    be strong and take heart
    and wait for the Lord. -Psalm 27:14

1:00 pm - We've said our "see ya afters" and they've wheeled him back.  It's a great day to save lives!!!

2:30 pm - The nurse just came to tell us all is going well!!!!  Keep praying.  We still have several hours to go.

3:25 pm - All is still going well.  Waiting for another update from the nurse. :]

6pm - surgery went well :) they're finishing up and were waiting on the doctor to come out and talk to us. Pray for patience and healing. God is GOOD!

7:15 pm - Spoke with Dr. Gerdisch.  John did really well the entire time! Since this condition is so rare they took lots of photos for medical teaching purposes they're planning on writing up a journal and publishing him! (He'll love that.)

Here's what the surgeon said:

-He is still in operating room receiving "platelets" to boost coagulation. 
-Dr. Gerdisch used the word he was "rock-solid" the entire time. 
-His left coronary artery (which was the defect) was huge and much extra time consumed as it was deeply embedded, but went very well!! 
-His ejection fraction (amount of blood leaving heart to be re-oxygenated) was 30-35% pre-op and has already dramatically increased to 45-50%!!

My man is a fighter.  When they were wheeling him into the OR, he was quoting scripture to his family as they parted.  I love this man!!

We'll see him in about an hour.  More updates to come soon.
Thank you all for you continual prayers.  Your support is overwhelmingly uplifting !!!

9:00 pm - We just saw him for the first time. He looked .... like he just had open heart surgery. Handsome, nonetheless. He was actually already waking up from the sedation. When the nurse said, "your family is here!" John nodded really big :]

11:00 pm - John is expected to be off of the ventilator tonight and sitting up in the morning! He's progressing along at an amazing rate!

I'm Home for some rest for the night. I'm thankful that my Jonathan picked up sign language as quick as he did. Because he was still intubated and coming out of sedation when we saw him (there's a tube down his throat helping him breathe), he wasn't able to talk. His brother told him "You know, you've got a good lady here." John shook his head no. Doug and I looked at each other puzzled. "Oh yeah, what do you have then?" He finger-spelled, me verbalizing each letter individually, 
I - H-A-V-E - A -M-I-R-A-C-U-L-O-U-S - W-O-M-A-N. *sigh* Not only is he all there, but he's amazing. And my heart is absolutely woven into his.