This stay wasn't terrible since he looked really good. His vitals were good and he wasn't covered in bruises or anything (surprisingly). They didn't give him an IV, hook him up to the monitors, or confine him to his bed. They did try to put him on restriction to his room, but he begged all the docs and nurses so much they finally gave in and let him roam the hospital. :) Basically we playroom hopped for two days!
Playing with trains
Bringing a wagon of toys back to the room after the docs made him stay in his room :)
After a long day it was time for bed. We were exhausted - well I think I was a little more than him! :)
At 4:30 am of course they came in to do more bloodwork. What a terrible way to wake up from a good night's sleep! Poor little man. :( Thankfully they got his labs drawn on the first attempt. That is a pretty rare thing with him.
In the morning he went down to the cafeteria with me to pick out some breakfast. He wasn't in the mood for the hospital food. After breakfast we met with the docs for rounds and found out his INR that day was all the way down to 2.6! We were pretty surprised that his levels dropped so much so quickly! During this stay we met with Dr. Golden and Dr. Zahka. They both discussed the upcoming plans for another cath, bronch, and surgery. This process will start sometime in April. I'm just waiting around to find out the plans and the days - they're still trying to coordinate schedules with pulmonology. I also was able to meet Dr. Stewart quickly. He's the cardiothoracic surgeon there and seems very nice.
After chatting with the doctors for a while Ethan was ready for the playroom. Surprise surprise. :) We made our rounds again. We were even able to visit with some friends (thanks Danielle and Kurt for coming and visiting!)
We met with nutrition that afternoon as well. Ethan has lost almost 5 pounds in the past month, so we're pretty concerned about that. He doesn't have that much excess so we definitely can't afford to lose any of it! Thankfully he's still on the growth chart so that's a big blessing! They want him to drink PediaSure to help get some more calories into his diet. Hopefully that will help him gain back some of this weight. However even though he loves chocolate milk, he doesn't want to drink this stuff. It's getting a little frustrating, but hopefully he'll start turning this around soon! This is definitely something we'll have to keep a close eye on.
The docs switched us from generic brand coumadin to name brand. They want to make sure that he didn't have a bad batch of medications or something since different companies produce the generic brands. We got the meds from the hospital pharmacy that afternoon and were told we were getting discharged! :) Yay!
By the time we got out of the parking garage and out onto Euclid (our first street) Ethan was sleeping soundly in the backseat! Poor boy doesn't get enough rest in the hospital!
Saturday morning we did another blood test at home to check the INR levels. He is at 1.9. Friday we were told that if he got below 2.5 we would have to restart the Lovenox injections. These are the shots he has to do in the belly -- definitely not a fan of these at all! Needless to say we had to do those and will have to continue them until he is back in his therapeutic range. Hopefully that will be very soon!
Today's blood test showed that he was 2.1. Since we were still too low we had to continue with the Lovenox shots today. His poor little belly is bruising terribly from it already. :( Hopefully tomorrow's bloodwork will show numbers good enough to get off the shots!
We will have to continue doing the daily blood checks at home. Then tomorrow we will go into the lab and get a full workup. They are going to check his INR then as well as checking his CBC to make sure he doesn't have a hidden infection somewhere. If he does that might be a reason for this crazy spike in his INR to begin with. We still really don't have a clue why this happened. Dr. Zahka said that he doesn't think we're going to get his blood all stabled out and where we want it until we fix his pulmonary artery. That might be causing this after all, so we'll just be up and down trying to stabilize him until surgery. :( Hopefully the bloodwork will give us some good answers. That also could be a cause for the weight loss.
Ethan also woke up this morning showing signs of pinkeye again! It seems that our little time in the pod has exposed us to more sickness again! :( I'll have to make an appointment in the morning to get him some new medication for this at the pediatrician.
Thank you so much for all of your prayers and messages of support! I also want to thank everyone who donated for the Hoops for Heart that Callie is participating in. She turned in $350 to her school! Awesome! :) I'll keep you all posted with any changes and with the information we get about Monday. Please keep him in your prayers!
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