02/20/2007

Well, Emery is having a great day! They started steroids again yesterday (a day early) because his lungs were getting really hazy and they felt it was the steroid rebound. On Sunday he was sitting at 65% to 70% oxygen and sometimes barely saturating over 85%, his CO2 was over 80, he was at 35 breaths per minute with a tidal volume of 17 and a PEEP of 10. I don't know what any of that means other than it was worse than when he first got on the conventional vent after the first round of steroids. So, now after nearly 36 hours of steroids he's at 35% oxygen, his CO2 is 52, his tidal volume is 16, his PEEP is 9 and he's at 25 breaths per minute. I don't know what that means other than he's way better off than he was before. He was saturating anywhere from 90% to 95% while I was there and only desatted once, and that was when they took him out to let me hold him. He hated it! He's on the roids so he gets roid rage and the nurse woke him up out of a sleep to let me hold him and he started to cry and get angry beyond all get out, dropped his heart rate to about 66 and desatted to 78 (which really isn't that low for him.. I've seen him in the 30s before), so they put him back in and he's much better. He might just not like to be held and whatever makes him happy is okay with me right now. Anything to keep him breathing and growing. The poor kid. He's on steroids and his weight gain slows down while he's on them and I have yet to figure out how to get a baby bowflex in there so he can pump up for a bit. He's also frequently given Ativan to calm down, and I have yet to find the local chapter of NNA (neonatal narcotics anonymous). They're pumping him full of enough drugs to get him kicked out of major league baseball, which means of course that he will fit into MLB just fine. As far as the steroids, the hope is that each time he rebounds he's a little better off than when he started, like two steps forward, one step back with the steroids. Slow, slow progress. We're on day 64 of the NICU. Oh, and by the way, Emery weighs 4 pounds!! (4 pounds 1 ounce to be exact!) Erik and I will be out of town for a few days so I'll be shy on the updates (for those of you who are addicted to the website, I recommend re-reading all of the old entries until now to get you through lol!) Keep all of us in your prayers and pray that Emery doesn't get sick! Love, Sarah, Erik and Emery