Moved again 9/3/05

10:30 p.m.

Well, anyone planning to visit us in the new room, change your plans. We've been moved back to the PICU. I'm very happy to be back with our favorite and very competent nurses, but not so happy with the reason we moved. The sutures where the ventric tube was removed has been leaking fluid since yesterday--they stitched it up tighter three times before it began leaking today for the fourth time. We were kind of wondering whether since the thing was leaking fluid that maybe the tube shouldn't have been left in--but we aren't brain surgeons. Anyway, they did a CT scan today, ordered several days ago to check on progress of healing, and found that the ventricles were enlarged indicating a superfluous amount of fluid. He needed to drain and couldn't. So they are putting the ventric tube back in. I wondered why they didn't leave the thing in anyway until his IPCs were consistently in single digits, but again, not a brain surgeon. They said, "clinically, he looked so good". The good news in the scan showed that the mid-line of the brain is now perfect and the right side (where the tumor was) has made good progresss toward it's normal shape--it still has a little ways to go but other than the excess fluid, his brain looks pretty good.

So anyway, we are back in our old room--7-608. Some one was slated to take it but then the new patient ended up not requiring intensive care. All those with the phone number, it's the same as it was.

They are in there now replacing the line. We have no reason to think it won't go well, but I will for sure update you tomorrow. The worst part was trying to get a vein for the IV and for labs. I hate to see him in pain. And it hurts for someone to be rooting around lookign for a vein. After several valiant tries, our great team of nurses and the brilliant vein-finding Dr. Melissa found a vein using an ultrasound machine and got the needle in that way. Poor little Theo's veins are so tiny and he's been stuck so many times since we've been here. I stayed in and rubbed his head and sang to him while they looked for veins. Hopefully they will be done with the procedure in a few minutes and he will have his methadone, some tylenol and some breastmilk (Theo's favorite cocktail) and sleep soundly throughout the night under the watch of the wonderful PICU nurses. I feel so much better knowing they are watching over him (along with his guardian angels :-)
Check in tomorrow---
Love,
Karla