Today(Monday) has been our best day so far. The chest tubes were removed this morning without any complications. He didn't really sleep the night before because of pain and because Norco has the opposite effect on my kids.....it keeps them awake! YAY!! I held his hand while the tubes were being removed. They sedated him which I was very grateful. However, even though you know that he is 100% ok, and going to wake back up in a few minutes, it was still one of the harder things to watch because he looked catatonic or dead, but with his eyes open. So upsetting. It made me cry.....actually I could have balled, but I knew he could still see me and I didn't want him to be scared. My sister said it so perfectly, "it is like your eyes are telling you one thing and your heart another." It was a very simple procedure done at his bedside, but so weird to see your child like that with his fixed gaze and pinpoint pupils. As he came off the sedation(katamine) he would start trying to say mommy, but only "ma" would come out. Little angel! I have never had a child in the hospital and now I have much more sympathy and understanding! So that is good!
He was like a different kid once those tubes were out. He started talking to me in his little hoarse voice. He started actually eating and drinking more. We did an Easter Egg hunt and rode in the little red wagon. He didn't want to get out of that wagon so he ate dinner in it and watched Mickey Mouse in that wagon. He smiled a lot today and laughed a lot today. I love when he says, "lay down mommy" as he points to the spot beside him bed. Or when he insist I hold BOTH his hands every time a nurse walks in or someone touches him. They are so surprised at how well he is recovering!!!!
We got some pretty good smiles in this thing!
He was still very guarded because of his "owie". He wakes up often confused and will stand up abruptly screaming and pulling at his chest. Talk about an adrenaline rush and not the fun kind. I saw incisions for the first time today. He has two separate tubes in his chest and also a two inch incision from his thoracotomy. Thoracotomy is an incision made in the chest so the surgeon can have access to the lungs. He had to have this because the infection was so severe they had to scrape the lungs and pull out the pus, dead tissue, and infections so that the normal, healthy lung could expand again. When a pneumonia causes an empyema(infection of the pleural space) antibiotics cannot reach this area and surgical debridement is almost always necessary. It was this process that cause the collapsed lung and he was breathing only with his right lung, but not anymore!!!
This hospital stay has made me think about all the sick children out there and how their parents must feel. My child is going to recover completely and go back to his normal life. There is a light at the end of our tunnel. I have thought about what it must feel like to have a little child with a terminal disease. One that you know they will in all likelihood never cure or recover from. I CANNOT imagine holding Hewitt knowing that he may not make it to his 3rd birthday. I CANNOT imagine him having a disease that is long term. So, I am grateful for our pneumonia because it has a cure. If you are reading this post and you have a child with a terminal disease, life long disease, or a child that has passed....know that I have thought of you often and have prayed for your breaking heart!
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