August 19, 2010

Cath Update #9: Up in the PCCU

Ayden has completed his journey up to the PCCU.  We have been in his room with him for about an hour.  He is doing great now, but the initial period was a bit stressful.

Ayden's feeding tube had been in his left nostril for several weeks.  Since we were going to have the benefit of full on sedation, we asked them to replace the tube and put it in his other nostril while he was knocked out.  They did that, but for some unknown reason, they put the tube NJ, not NG where it has been.  This had to be corrected before he got any Pedialyte, or he would just reflux it up.

Of course, by this time, the anesthesia had worn off, his throat was sore from the intubation (he was extubated before we saw him, which is good), he was sleepy, and he was hungry.  In other words, he was a molotov cocktail waiting to be lit, and having to peel off the tape holding the feeding tube down so it could be pulled back into his stomach was the fuse.  And boy did he go off.  For the third time in almost as many days, he threw the fit to end all fits.  This time, however, we had the "benefit" of him being attached to a monitor.  This gave us the joy of seeing him raise his heart rate to 198 bpm.  This is not unusual for babies that get really mad (including babies without any heart issues), so it did not raise any alarms, but as parents who have seen really high heart rates that meant something bad, it was not a desirable experience.

But, we got the tube moved to where it needed to be, got some Pedialyte in him, and got him calmed down.  He is coming back to us fairly quickly now.  He's been going to town on his pacifier (once we doused it with Pedialyte to wet his very dry mouth) and we've even seen a few smiles.  The only thing he is getting is some IV fluids and some Tylenol to help with the sore throat.  He's still clearly tired, but he's fighting sleep right now.  All in all, he's doing well and on pace to go home tomorrow, as long as nothing pops up in the mean time.

I'll say it again.  God has been very good to us today.

1 comment:

  1. We are praying all keeps going along peacefully and that God's hand keeps popping up everywhere! Poppy said he was beautiful and he looked so healthy! And Kallie thinks about you guys often!

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