Today was a crazy day! I have a tendency to ramble...HA! So I'm going to try my hardest to keep it simple. I only got 3 hours of sleep last night so I was really tired...but wide awake when I got up at 6:45am b/c I was so excited and very anxious. I went to the lobby and got my little packet of information at 8am. I went in and talked to the lady about the consultations. She said that our plastic surgeon (Dr. Bruce Bauer) wasn't going to get in until 5pm so the consult would be Thurs or Fri. They would text me when my appt time was. So I had until 7pm tonight to do nothing!
I came back to my room and rented a car online for the day. I took the hotel shuttle to the airport, then took the rental car shuttle to Enterprise, where I got a car for the day. I got a navigation system and had written down addresses to a few places.
First I went to the 6th Floor Museum - the place where Oswald shot JFK. It was such a great, informative museum. It was SO much better than I thought it'd be. Phones had to be off. When I got done I checked my phone and I had a text saying that my plastic surgery consult would be at 1:30pm!! Ummmm...it was 12:45pm and I was about 30 mins away (in a strange city that I'm not used to)! So I ran across the street, took pictures, ran back to the car, and drove like the dickens back to the hotel. I was about 10 mins away (and it was about 1:10pm) when I got a call asking to move my appt back an hour! I was too far away from the museum to go back. I'd planned on eating lunch at the Hard Rock Cafe after I was done at the museum b/c it was right around the corner. (If you have read all my Europe e-mails from 3 years ago you'll know how disappointed I was that I didn't get to go to the HRC!!!) So I just decided to come back to the hotel. I freshened up and reviewed my questions for Dr. Bauer.
Meeting him was a big deal to me. This is the guy who's going to be operating on my child at least 5 times! I was actually nervous...and anxious! I met his 2 nurses, his scheduler, and him. I was only in there for 15 mins b/c we'd already communicated by e-mail and telephone. So he'd already told me the plan. I had a few questions for him that he'd answered; and I gave him a few more pictures. He said that we can start around November, or if we wanted to wait till after the holidays that'd be fine too. I'll have to talk to Dustin & see what we wanna do.
I asked if we could wait a while or if he recommended starting now. He said there's no benefit in waiting so we might as well start. I also asked about getting an MRI to check for NCM (neurocutaneous melanocytosis). I'll explain what NCM is later; but he said that yes, we do need to do that, but it's not urgent. Each expander surgery will be about 1-1 1/2 hrs and each removal surgery will be about 2-3 hours. His scheduler will e-mail me with surgery dates and we'll just schedule with her and then go to Chicago for them! I also asked about hair growth. He said that because he's moving the scalp from the back to the front that I'll be amazed at how much I won't be able to tell that she even had a nevus. He traced an area on his own head of where Brooklyn will have scars. She'll have one behind her right ear, one along the right hair line, and one across the top of her entire brow line...fully across each brow. I need to still ask him about satellites showing up. (I'll explain that later, too.)
When I was done with my appt it was just 2:45pm so I went to a huge mall... It had a carousel and an ice skating rink in it! I got the girls a few things at the Disney Store (60% off sale I couldn't resist), then ate at Chick-Fil-A, returned the car, came back to the hotel, and went to the welcome reception that started at 7pm.
Something amazing happened tonight... When I was on the shuttle from the airport back to the hotel I started talking to a man (Pierre) and his 8 year old son (Gabriel). He answered a lot of questions I had and I answered a lot of questions he had. We talked the whole way back to the hotel. He asked how old Brooklyn was and I told him that she is 4 months old today. He was shocked b/c his son was 4 months old when they went to their first conference. We continued to talk and then went our separate ways when we got back to the hotel.
At the welcome reception tonight a lady went up on stage and introduced the outgoing director (or something like that...he was very high up at Nevus Outreach Inc) and who walked up on stage...but Pierre!! He gave a speech about how much NOI has changed his life and then said that he was just talking to a lady (Kathleen???) who he was on the shuttle with 8 years ago when his son was only 4 months old. Then he said that he was on the shuttle today with a mom who has a 4 month old. He kept saying how much he'd hoped that NOI would change my life too. He mentioned our conversation numerous times during his speech... Amazing! That's more than a sign if you ask me! :o)
Anyways, I've gotten to meet a few people that I've "met" online in the Yahoo! NOI Support Group. It's so great to be able to meet them in person, ask them tons of questions, answer questions, and just socialize and not have to explain what Brooklyn has! I never in a million years would have met these great people if Brookie wouldn't have had this nevus. I 100% firmly believe that the Lord chose me to be Brooke's mom because he knew I could handle this. That's right... He.Chose.ME... and I'm so blessed!
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