CICU

He is back in CICU and his heart his doing well, he doesn't have the buddha belly anymore. He looks really good,they are going to keep him sedated today and let him start waking up tomorrow. We are definetly heading in the right direction!!

STILL WAITING

The heart is in and they said things are looking good. They will call in an hour with an update.

THE BIG DAY!

It is 1:00am and we are waiting for this to be over and have our baby safe and sound and back with us. They said the heart was good and were proceeding with the transplant. It will be a long night but I do have a calm about it that it will all be fine. I know this is what has to be done. He was not healthy and could not continue the way he was. Please let him be fine, he is such a sweet boy and has to be with us. Hopefully he will be through around 5:00 or 6:00am. We love you Lance!!!!

Looks like dehydration

His lab work is leaning towards dehydration and hopefully this is a mixture of his bad cold, him not being to fond of his "Fat Free diet",and a combination of some of his meds aggravating things more. We are hopeful it is that and we can get him back on the right track. The doctor did say that his BNP was a little elevated and this can indicate heart trouble, but it is not so high that she feels it is something to be overly concerned with at this point. I am going to pray that it is the lesser of the two and he will get his fluids in and pee on his own. The doctor did say that she would check with the nutritionist and see if it is possible to add in more foods that he would want. Our thinking is that if he can have what he has been wanting for the last month he will chow down and get back to normal. Please, Please let it be this simple.

Not sure what to think

Today when I got home from work Grandma Judy let me know Lance had not been to the bathroom all day. After a call to The Sibley Heart Center we were on our way to Children's Health Care of Atlanta for what I was told would be some lab work. When we got there they told me Lance was a direct admit and was going straight to the cardiac stepdown unit. They did a chest x-ray and ran some lab work and still at this point no urine output. So at this point it has been over 24 hours since he has gone to the restroom. We just found out that they are going to put an IV with fluids and if he has not had any urine within a couple of hours they will put a cath in and try some other things. At this point we are not sure if this is a problem relating to his heart function. I will hopefully know more tomorrow.

Day Thirteen

It seems as though this nightmare is coming to a close. We have had so many ups and downs and I am so thankful for where we are. His chest tube drainage is really starting to slow down. The nurse just came in and told me that in the past three hours he only put out 10cc, and that is a BIG improvement from where we were. As soon as this stops we can go home. Lance has been a good sport through it all. He just got done with physical therapy where they played some soccer with some of the nurses in the hall. He has great strength, we just hope he gets back to his chatty ways. He has had plenty of visitors who helped bring his smile back. We had our rough times in the beginning with heart rythym issues and blood pressure problems but with medicine this was straightned out. One of the medicines didn't agree with him and for about a week he had to eat from an NG tube because he couldn't keep anything down. Needless to say, it was a happy day for all of us when he got his grilled cheese sandwich, he so wanted!!! When I look over this past two weeks I am so Thankful we are at the end of this journey. It was tough, but we have made it and I KNOW WE ARE SO MUCH STRONGER!!!! As many poeple have said this puts everything in prespective and it so did! I surely won't sweat the trivial things in life like I use to. We love our boys so much and can't wait to all be in our home together.

Update!!

Lance's surgery has been changed to April 17th. Aetna took over our FMLA area at work and you have to have worked at least 1250 hours in 12 months and I have worked 1003 hours in the past 12 months. They did tell me that I would be paid for my leave, but that the portion of the leave that protects your job, I was not qualified for due to my hours. So I talked to Dr. McConnell and he said no problem we can wait until April and then I would have enough hours. Getting paid doesn't do me any good if I get fired and don't have insurance. I am sure SunTrust wouldn't have let me go but in this economy, you can't be to careful. I know I am on over planner, but I get it from my Darling Mother. Things have been going well, my boys (all three of them) are so crazy and funny. I love them with all my heart and they all make me sooooo happy!!! I feel like a different person from one year ago today. I have learned how to handle things differently and to enjoy things as they come. Signing off for now