Friday, March 29, 2013

Cameron's heart surgery: Day 5

I can't believe that we are already 5 days into this adventure of ours.  I am happy to report that today was pretty uneventful, and yet so much happened!

Today they removed Cameron's LA line and his Catheter.  They also were able to wean him off of epinephrine.  The Cardiac rhythmic specialist wanted to try and determine a more definite reason for his rhythmic problems on his first night of recovery, so they ran what they call a wire test.  This test is a bit unnerving for a mother to watch or be a part of.  The Cardiac team gives him a dose of a very strong medication that stops his heart so they are able to control different portions of the heart with the pace maker and determine what happened.  Unfortunately after doing the test 5 times and raising the dose the test was inconclusive and so they are probably going to try it again tomorrow.

Cameron started opening his eyes today.  He looks like he is hopped up on drugs ... which I guess he is!!!  It is a good thing that he is starting to be more alert though and hysterical when he give the stink eye to the nurses who are messing with his dressing, tubes, or doing anything that he doesn't like.

I think one of the saddest things to see for me right now is that because he is still intubated he can't make any noise when cries.  You see his poor face crinkled, his eyes water, but can't hear anything because of the tubes going down his throat.  :-(

The team started to try and prepare him to be extubated (take him off of the ventilator) today, but it didn't happen.  They may be extubating him in the middle of the night or it might be in the morning when I'm there again. I stayed long enough to hear the plans for his extubation and came back to the Ronald McDonald house to eat a free dessert and lay my VERY tired body down for a little bit of rest.  It is surprising to me that sitting in one place all day can be so tiring, but as one of my friends said on Facebook ... "worry is very tiresome!"  I think that combined with the constant anticipation of things throughout the day is what does me in each day.  In any case I am extremely tired at the end of the day.  I may or may not get a phone call in the middle of the night and since my eyes are swollen and ready to shut permanently while I am typing this I am going to go to sleep.

I'm so glad Cameron is doing so well.  All of his doctors are very very happy with his progress.  

 
I don't know what I would do without the Ronald McDonald house.  It is my safe haven every morning and every evening.



one of the nurses found me a comfy chair and we wheeled it over to my baby's bedside.  I guess they got the hint that I wasn't leaving his side anytime soon.

can you find the baby?

hello world!

2 comments:

Peter and Mandy said...

Glad to hear things are going well.

thenaptimebaker said...

So thankful that things are looking up! I know you are both so tired and poor little Cameron is such a trooper!