Day of Healing!

Jaime had a good night and great day...all things considered, of course! Is he 100%, NO WAY...FAR FROM IT, but there's definite signs of Jaime being on the mend! For example, Jaime's most recent blood gas had a CO2 of 46! YEA! Also, this morning, he was huffing and puffing a little, very restless, and touchy...by this afternoon, he wasn't huffing and puffing, but was still very sensitive to touch. We were able to get him up into his swing, but he didn't want ANYTHING to do with being held...this kind of made me sad!

First time out of bed in the swing since surgery.

By tonight...well, the proof is in the photo! :-)


Some little baby fell asleep on me after he had his 20+ staples removed-no more "Franken-Baby" and yes, I kept the staples! What a great feeling it was to hold him! It's only been a week since we've really cuddled, but it seemed like an eternity, especially since I'm not getting my daily dose of cuddling, hugs and kisses from Jared! Speaking of little Jared...he woke up again with 102.6 temp! :-( Tom took him to the drs., looks like he has a sinus infection, just as we all had suspected. Dr. Hellerstein put him on antibiotics...she asked about Jaime, too, then the boys were off to get the Rx filled. Having said all of that, Jared called me this evening to tell me that he threw up his dinner...not sure what that was all about, but it was so "sweet" of him to call and let me know! HA! Once again he won't be at school tomorrow! (Just in case anyone from WES is reading this...) He's so funny with calling me lately...yesterday he called to tell me he accidentally broke a glass of mine. This year in 1st grade, the kids had to memorize their parent's cell phone number...good thing he had that assignment because I told him he can call me whenever he wants to! I LOVE hearing his little stories...makes me feel like I'm at least somewhat with him. I especially like his messages when I can't get to the phone...I save them, my favorite is still his message telling me that he "got the Lego out!" :-)

Back to Jaime...changes made during rounds: His Morphine and Versed drips were both cut literally in half (YIKES), he's been put on Lactated Ringers (basically another IV fluid replacement), he's off of his Lasix for the time being, he has an echo scheduled for the 5th, they went up on his TPN's and Lipids, and cut his Factor from every 6 hours to every 12 hours. So far all of his labs have been good...they are monitoring his Liver function and renal labs very closely. He's still not getting any milk because he still has the repogle draining, he did have some blood in it again, but that's because Jaime decided to pull it out and it had to be reinserted which always causes some irritation.
Jaime is still on 6 liters high flow O2, satting in the high 90's and he's still getting his vibrating CPT's! Oh, and they aren't weaning his flow yet because his right lung is once again collapsed...go figure! His chest x-ray is still junky, I told them in rounds today that tomorrow's chest x-ray will show his left lung collapsed...that's just the way Jaime seems to be going this trip to Cincy! He will also be having an abdominal x-ray along with a chest x-ray in the morning...they call this a baby gram. Dr. Tiao wants to see what Jaime's bowels are doing...there is still only minimal bowel sounds. As I said before, it's not like anyone really expects to hear them or even see them working at this point because of how invasive his surgery was. For being 1 week post-op, Jaime is doing remarkably well! (FYI, Jaime was able to be weighed and measured, he is 13.6 lbs and 25.6 inces long.)
Though Jaime appears to be holding his own, we're still looking at a prolonged NICU stay...mostly because of how long recovering from this major surgery will take, but hey, if it makes Jaime feel better and "normal" it's well worth the stay! We've accepted the fact that we'll be celebrating Thanksgiving in Cincy...why not? We've already celebrated, Palm Sunday, Easter, Mother's Day, Memorial Day, all of our birthday's, Father's Day, July 4th and Halloween....here, what's another holiday? The "joke" is that we'll be home by Christmas...and if we're not, Jaime's holiday lights will just change to Christmas ones...no biggie! :) How you deal with things is all about your perspective. Tom and I are not about to take Jaime home until he is 100% healed, it's not like Cincinnati Children's is a hop, skip and a jump away. One of the NP's and I had a conversation about this very thing this afternoon...we're thinking that there there is NO WAY in hell that Dr. Tiao is going to discharge Jaime until HE'S comfortable doing so...hence, the goal to be home by Christmas...Jaime is Dr. Tiao's baby! :-) (It's so nice to be loved!!!!)

The last thing I'll mention about Jaime is that Noelle from OT came today. She tried to work with Jaime...and did for a little, but at that time he wasn't all that thrilled about her being there. Jaime is still very stiff, guarded, really and because he chooses to lay in only one position, his torticollis has gotten worse, along with his flattened head. (You know, both of my boys really didn't have to have so many similarities.) Last night, we were finally able to lay him on his tummy and that's how he was sleeping when I left tonight. Any developmental milestones that Jaime was reaching have now gone by the wayside...we're looking at starting completely over! Hopefully in the upcoming weeks, we'll be able to get him back on track! Jaime has a great OT, PT and SP team here...I have no doubt that they'll help Jaime obtain his milestones once again.

Here are pics of Noelle and Jaime.

I think that just about sums up Jaime's day. He has Liz again tonight, we love here...actually for the last 3 shifts he's had nurses' named Elizabeth...it's kind of funny! All of them have been great...rumor has it, he'll have "Beth" and "Liz" again tomorrow. I told them that the 3 of them should just rotate, then we'll ALWAYS know who has Jaime...Elizabeth! :-)

Look who came to play with Jaime this afternoon. ELMO!

Jaime resting comfortably with his Pooh "Ni-ni" in his FAVORITE (head-flattening) position.

Funny face, back up in the swing!

Sleeping so comfortably holding on to his high flow tubing...just before the surgeon came to take Jaime's staples out!

Don't forget to get out and vote tomorrow...