Tuesday, March 25th

Let's see ... what's changed since last we spoke ...

First, the medical stuff. He's gotten a tracheostomy, which means that the breathing tube that was in his mouth has been removed and replaced by a similar aparatus that enters in the front of his neck. It doesn't sound pleasant; but, he looks much more comfortable. That tube in his mouth always looked uncomfortable. They've also removed all tubes from his nose; the arterial catheter in his neck and, even, removed the ventriculoscopy tube from his head. From mid-neck up, he looks relatively normal. He's got a beard, 'cause they haven't shaved him since he was admitted. They talk about shaving him almost every day; but, every day, he's got more beard than the day before. He's not getting any more sedation medicine. He's getting a full day's worth of calories, now; he had lost 15 lbs, but has gained back some of that. He's still running a fever, but it's low - 99.6 - 102.1, today. And, the big medical news of the day - they've lowered his oxygen concentration on the respirator to 40% (from 60%) and the assisted repiratory rate to 6 breaths per minute. He's breathing about 12-16 breaths per minute; but, the machine is only helping with 6 of those. So, he's moving towards getting off of the respirator. So, lots of new medical news.

How's he doing? Well, he's still very lethargic. If we see him for a total of two hours in a day (there's four, 30-minute visits), he probably is awake for only about 20-30 minutes of the visits. The nurses say that he's rousable all day and that when they wake him up, he's responsive. And, for us, when he is awake, he is pretty responsive. He's getting better at opening his eyes and getting better at looking at things; but, that's still one of the most obvious struggles. He nods pretty frequently and will still write us the occassional message. His handwriting has deteriorated pretty badly and there's lots of messages that we can't read, at all. The ones that we can read, though, show that he's still in there and his spirits remain strong and positive.

Highlights from the past few days - when I asked him what he thought about all day, he said, "food, girls" (we interpret "girls" to mean, "the girls," as in Abby, Shelby, Maggie, Victoria, Macy and Marley). I stopped at Target and got him one of those squishy balls with the rubber hair on it and he loved that. He was really working his right hand and arm, bouncing it off of his belly and rolling it back and forth up the bed.

He had a CT scan today and, hopefully, we'll know those results tomorrow. And, hopefully, they'll show that the pressure in his head is leveled off or reducing. But, between being moved for the CT scan, doing lots more breathing on his own, and all the playing with his new ball, he was so tired for the last visit of the day, that he really didn't wake up at all. So, hopefully, he wore himself out and will get a good night sleep. And, hopefully, so will the rest of us.