Josiah

Todays posting on the blog
Greetings All

Today has been pretty good for Josiah. He has been taken off his paralysis, but is still receiving a lot of sedatives to keep him sleepy and morphine to take off the pain. Earlier in the day he was brady-ing/d-sating but that seems to be improving with each handling. He's also receiving full feeds continuously (milk is regulated by a machine so that it doesn't go into his belly too fast).

For a while there he was difficult to ventilate, but he was given a different machine that seems to meet his needs better. So he takes breathe right now on his own power, but the machine will jump in a breathe for him if he doesn't draw in enough air.

Right now the biggest concern is his leak around the trache. As his stoma (the incision in his throat) heals, the seal will be better but until then we just have wait to see what happens. Too much air is escaping out of his throat and not going into his lungs. So he's not getting the volume and pressure he needs, but his oxygen percentage remains decent. An X-ray of his chest shows that one of his lungs might be partially collapsed, but it could also be that he has fluid in his lungs. With this information pneumonia is a serious concern, but right now he seems to be coughing up a lot of those secretions and taking deeper breathes so hopefully his lungs are improving.

Josiah is squiggling and moving his body a little. He also openned up his eyes a little which was so nice to see, but he's still waaaaaaaaaay too groggy to really be alert a look around. Right now Marie has him sucking a soother ... which has to be a pretty surreal experience now that he doesn't have a tube in the way and can enjoy a full (not cut in half) soother!

Josiah's G-Tube surgery is still scheduled for May 9. Appearantly it's nothing compared to trache surgery, but eh ... it's still surgery, right? In a couple weeks (after the morphine, sedatives, and paralysis has completely worn off) we'll bring in an OT (occupational therapist) to observe his swallowing technique. That is HUGE - if Josiah can breathe on his own it doesn't solve all his problems, but gives us the hope that he might be able to manage his spit ups and burps, not allowing them to go down into his lungs.

We are also praying for his surgery to heal well. There is a bit of an ulcer forming under the trache from the appliance rubbing the skin, and his double-chin is sometimes getting in the way, but all in all it's doing OK. The main thing is that the trache needs to remain 90 degrees to his body, and the sensitive area needs to remain dry (the have placed gauze around the trache to absorb the post-op 'ooze' that secretes from the area).

Enjoy the pics of our man! Time for me to get some dinner.

All glory & praise to God who is good and does good things.
- Andrew, Marie & Josiah