Surgery Frustration

About a month ago Colin had surgery to repair a cleft lip. The surgeon did an amazing job, working on a teeny 10-week-old infant, and in spite of my worry the little guy came through like a champ. And when the skin glue and scab came off... it was AMAZING!!! His lip was utterly perfect, and you could tell that the small scar would be almost invisible in just a year or two.

Now, I'm not complaining about my surgeon. The guy did an amazing job, and is obviously very, very talented. But over the past week or so his lip has started to pull up some. Not a cleft, of course, but not the beautiful work that you can see in the photo here. I'm so frustrated, and worried that he may need a second surgery to have a "normal" lip structure. If it were somewhere else on his body I'd be less worried, but this is his face. And like it or not people will make superficial judgments about him for the rest of his life. I just don't want him to have an instant handicap... and yet I hate the thought of another surgery.

Forget the expense (although I don't want to think about the cost!), I'm more frustrated at the thought of the little guy having to go under the knife again. And I'm wondering when we'd have to do it, what is involved, and what is the likelihood that a second surgery will have a better result. When I saw the initial result I was so thrilled, now I'm just frustrated.

To me he's gorgeous and perfect, but how will others judge him? Will this impact his speech? What other things are going to spiral from this? I'll be calling the surgeon tomorrow, so I guess we'll just have to wait and see what he recommends. I'm betting we'll be heading in to his office in the very near future.