The good news is that last night they were able to extubate Lucas. The bad news is that by 5 am this morning he had some labs that did not make sense so they had to do some interventions. His hemoglobin was low so they gave him some blood. And his lactate levels were high. The reason that was confusing is that his oxygen levels looked really good. High lactate levels indicate there is a lack of oxygen. Anyway, so they treated that by changing him to a CPAP machine to allow him to get more oxygen. They also did another echo to check the functions of his heart, and everything looks good so far. It seems as if the part of his heart that pushes blood to the lungs just needs time to get stronger, it is not used to doing the work that it needs to do and they say that can just take time. So he is breathing on his own, they are just supporting him by giving him oxygen. This allows the lungs to expand better and get stronger so they can do it on their own.
Then around lunch time he pulled a stunt where he stopped breathing a few times so they increased the amount of oxygen he was getting. Also, he was so irritated and angry, and I mean red-faced! That they finally gave him something more than Tylenol for the pain. I also think he was starving, and as I was talking to him he was rooting, poor little dude. (And talk about break a mom's heart, trying to soothe him with pacifier only!)
And they uncovered his chest so now you can see the stitches, which just made me tear up.
In more positive news they are giving him some IV nutrition. And this evening they were able to take off the CPAP machine. He has pulled one more stunt of not breathing but now that it hs been a few hours everything is looking better. Once he can stop this stop breathing crap, and stabilizes then we can start trying to feed him, maybe tomorrow?
So I guess the road to recovery is going to be a bit of a roller coaster, and I am going to do my best to take it one day at a time. Jeff reminds me that it is a marathon.
2 comments:
Oh My Precious Family!
What a roller coaster marathon you are on. I am glad Lucas is showing his opinions a bit and hope his breathing stabalizes so he can get some nutrition in his little tummy. You are all champions.
Love you so so much, Mama Z.
Little Lucas is breaking my heart from a thousand miles away! I love that he already has strong opinions which sound like they include mommy and fewer nurses. :) There's only one nurse he wants, and it's you.
Good luck today. I hope he can start to eat. I hope you feel of my prayers. I wish I was there. Love you so!
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