Home!

We got home yesterday afternoon and have had a blast being home with our little buddy. He slept pretty well, and is doing everything a baby should be doing. We met this morning with our Pediatrician, and he gave Mitchell a clean bill of health. This afternoon, our visiting nurse came by and gave Mitchell his meds for the day. She'll come everyday till tuesday, and then once a week to change his dressing. It's fun to spend more time with him, learn his queues, and see more of his personality everyday. We're working on a photo album of our experience, and will find some way to post it here in the days to come.

We rejoice, and we hope you do too, in a God that grants us grace to order our pain aright, and in the darkness is there to sustain. We wouldn't give up the lessons weve learned, and after all of it, we gladly say with many others that we have made no sacrifice. God has given us everything we have needed and more. "Hast thou not seen, all that is needful has been sent by His gracious ordaining."

What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare His own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? -Romans 8:31,32.

Last things

Discharge papers are almost complete. The pharmacy should be here shortly to bring us the meds we'll need for the next week or so, then we'll do todays infusion and be ready to head westbound around 2 or so. PRAISE GOD! We are so excited to go home!!!!!!!!!!!!

Going out with a bang

Mitchell had a rough last day. It's 5pm now, and he hasn't eaten since 7am. He was on call most of the day for the cath lab and a circumcision. The catheter went in today at 2, and he was brought back to us at 3. He was drugged for the catheter procedure, and had a hard time waking up. So for two hours, he was hooked back up to the monitors, and nursing staff tried to stimulate him back to baby-hood. It was scary to go back to monitors and medications rather than the pooping, eating,
screaming, smiling baby we know. He's still in and out of sleep now, but the sleep times are getting shorter and shorter. So hopefully he'll be able to feed soon. Otherwise, we are scheduled to leave tomorrow, which is so great we can hardly believe.

Mitchell vs. Enterobacter Cloacae, day 5

A busy day of changed plans. The catheter lab was closed today, so we never got the PICC line installed. We are hoping to get that in the morning or for sure by the aftenoon tomorrow.
Because the original blood cultures tested positive in the entire blood stream, and not just local to the central line, antibiotics will have to be administered for 6 weeks instead of 2. So we are on day 5 of 42 of antibiotics through IV. So after the PICC line is in tomorrow, we should be able to head home on wednesday and do the meds at home. We were told that this morning but were reluctant to believe it. But after talking now with the Home Meds nurse, and the discharge coordinator, it looks more and more like a reality. We're so excited to get out of Ann Arbor!

It's been a long wait since thursday, when they took Mitchells blood culture. Completed results should come back sometime today, but so far so good. And since he's had a clear culture for three days, he'll have a PICC line (Peripherally inserted central catheter) inserted today around noon. That will replace the IV we've had to move every few days, and hopefully we can bring him home with it soon.
Otherwise, Mitchell is doing well. He's off regimented feeding schedules and can eat whenever he wants. He's sleeping at night, which we hope will last a while. And most of the time, he's 'free range', and we can walk him around when his IV isn't hooked up.

Something to smile about

Preliminary results are in from yestedays blood cultures, and they are clear. If they remain negative for the next 24 hours, then the antibiotics have been effective, and yesterday would have been day one of our 14 day countdown. If, after 7 or 8 days, everything else is going well, we might be able to come home before the two weeks are up. At that point, Mitch would still have an IV and we'd be administering antibiotics through it for another week or so.

We recieved word today that the infection showed up in the original culture from a periphery blood draw. That means that the infection isn't localized around the umbilical cord/belly button, but has spread throughout all of the blood. A fresh round of blood cultures started today, and we should have those results in the morning friday, to show if the antibiotics are effective in killing the infection. We also learned today that our extended stay (7-14 days) will start on the day that we get a clear culture. Hopefully that is today.
Otherwise, Mitchell has been doing very well. He is doing well with feedings and even started to nurse today.