Pictures Abound

In lieu of an update at this point, I have some pictures from the last week to share with everyone.

Wyatt pleading with his eyes, "Okay, this isn't funny any more; get me out of here."

Randi holding Wyatt... our little unicorn with an IV sticking out of the front of his head

Me playing with the camera while Randi holds Wyatt, but it turned out to be a pretty cool picture

Parks and dad watching sports and dozing

Parks's first real bath at home. All-in-all he did very well.

Dad in action

Randi as the closer, drying Parks off

Endo...Smells More Like Outdo

Regarding the endocrinologist.

After the post yesterday, they increased Wyatt's IV fluid rate in order to stabilize him before he saw the pediatric endocrinologist. When the endo did get a chance to see him, his blood sugar levels were in the 70's, well above the minimum of 50 they like to see. He ordered a whole series of blood tests that they did not draw blood for yesterday, and here's the kicker, we could not draw the blood for the tests until his glucose levels fell back down below 45. So, basically, we had to make him sick before we could make him better.

Well, sure enough, when we arrived last night to the hospital, his blood sugars had fallen again to 42 because they decreased his IV dextrose rate. Our whole visit was watching them take almost 10 ml of blood from our 3 pound baby for these tests. Also, some of the tests that they were drawing for are send off tests, which means that they will not be back until Monday at the earliest. The nurse that was attending Wyatt last night has had him previously during all this and pushed to increase his IV rate back up to gte him stable again. Hopefully, no one will touch the IV pump again until we get these tests back and have a real plan.

Sorry, the title is a really bad quote from the movie "Friday". It's all I can think about when someone refers to an endocrinologist as an "endo".

Falling Asleep At The Wheel

Not literally......yet

We apologize that it's been close to a week since our last post, but we have been semi-conscious for most of it. Parks has been home a full week, and we are still trying to figure everything out. What works well for him and what doesn't work so well for him. It's like trying to feel out a new roommate back in my single days. What their schedule is, where they like to put things, what pushes their buttons to get them upset. Of course, there are some things that our children need that I never had to do for any other roommates, such as wiping their behinds, having them urinate on me, all night feedings, literally carrying them on my back. We have had our bumps in the road, but are surviving. Parks is growing well and is 18 inches long, weighing 5 pounds 14 ounces. He had his "minor" surgery today, and it appears to have gone very well, although I have not inspected the area yet.

Until last night Wyatt had been holding steady most of the week with no news to report as they decreased his IV dextrose and increased his breast milk. He was almost to the point of discontinuing his IV completely and graduating to bottle feeds until his blood sugar levels started to dip dangerously low again. He has really been on a roller coaster over the last week with this. His blood glucose levels were anywhere from 31 to121 throughout the night. Randi met with the neonatologist this afternoon, and we have finally said enough is enough. We requested they call in a pediatric endocrinologist who specializes in these matters. He is scheduled to see Wyatt this evening, and Randi and I are heading to the hospital later to see what was determined. They are running all sorts of blood tests in anticipation of what he might want, but we thought that at this time the ICN did not have a very clear idea of how to treat him properly. Hopefully, a fresh set of eyes will shed some light on the matter, so that we can progress in his treatment and get him home. Please, pray that some level of control will be regained in this situation and that nothing serious is wrong. We'll keep you posted.

The Hare And The Tortoise

Spoiler Alert: The Tortoise Wins The Race

We have been preaching since day one to the ICN that they need to take it slow with Wyatt since he was an asymmetrically growth restricted baby whose heart and brain received the majority of blood in utero in order to sustain vital functions. Thus, his other organs and system were stunted in growth and development. I believe they are finally catching on. We called a few times last night to get updates whenever they would do a heel stick to check his glucose levels. Over the night he was able to hold his blood sugar levels just above an acceptable range. Again, this morning we called a couple times, and he started getting back to the type of numbers that were more normal. The doctor gave orders to increase Wyatt's breast milk and decrease his IV fluids again but at a much lower rate. While Randi and I were at the there tonight, the nurse checked his glucose again, and he appeared to be responding well.

Over the next 4 days, they will decrease his IV fluids and increase his feeds to make sure that he is, at least, getting the same amount of overall intake into his system, using a formula determined by his body weight. After that, they should hold everything steady for a day or two to see how well he tolerates continuous feeds without the IV before trying to wean him off of them. Next, they will try to him on continuous feeds for 2 hours and off for one hour, persistently checking his glucose levels. If he remains stable they will then have him on continuous feeds for one hour and off for two hours, until they titrate him off continuous feeds completely. The ultimate goal is to get him accustomed to 3 hour feeds, so they can introduce the bottle. This is all assuming that the doctor doesn't get a wild hair and do something drastic again. It is understandable to see him having such progress for how small he is and want to try to push him a little harder, but we feel that the grade on this slope needs to be very gradual.

UPDATE: Since I drafted this post last night, Randi called the ICN in the wee hours of the morning to check on his latest blood glucose level. They were 81, the highest they have been in days. As the recommended schedule has been presented, they will decrease his IV fluid rate today before noon and check him again for stability. We are going up there a couple times today as a tag-team to check on him, and we should have another update tonight.