Dealing with the overwhelming fear of heart surgery on an infant

(Editor's note: This is the second of a two-part series detailing the birth and heart surgery of American reporter M. Scott Carter's son, Zachary.)

By M. Scott Carter

American Staff Writer

OKLAHOMA CITY -- For a brief moment, we thought Zach might draw a bye for his first surgery. His blood oxygen levels were tracking much higher than normal. Because of this, the doctors wanted to stop the drug and see if those oxygen levels would stay high enough to send him home.

If so, Zach might go home early and, even better, bypass the first surgery.

The normal blood oxygen level for an infant is 100 percent; for Zach, a high was 87 percent.

Two days after he was born, he was taken off the drug and slowly, his blood oxygen numbers fell. Wednesday night, Nov. 14, his oxygen level crashed like a bad ride on the stock market, falling into the low 40s.

Surgery was scheduled for Nov. 20.

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That Tuesday dawned cold, bright and smelling of fall. Karen -- who had been discharged just a couple of days before -- made a rare appearance home. She tried keeping herself busy, but the pain from surgery and the fact she was frightened beyond all reason did nothing for her.

Neither of us slept Monday night.

By Tuesday morning, we were both a tense bundle of frayed nerves.