Someone Is Looking Out For Him

My family and I are pretty sure AJ sees his angels….

He will smile in your direction but he won't be looking directly at you sometimes. He may look above you, next to you, or in the complete opposite direction. But his eyes are totally fixed in that particular space and he will just sit/lay there smiling. Tonight, he was laying in bed and I was standing over him readjusting one of his tubes. He pointed up and then smiled angelically. Obviously I saw noting but he kept his gaze there for a few moments before looking back at us. It is such a fascinating moment but questioning at the same time…he cannot point up yet haha. Too soon. 

With that, Jacob's surgery went well. Those of you on Facebook know that he was able to come home the same day; as he was originally scheduled to spend some time in the hospital. And having him home has been absolutely wonderful! But we have run into a bit of a problem, which we knew was certainly a major risk. Jacob is sick. Since he cannot have any floor time we can only sit him up in his high chair, wheelchair, or in bed. We can hold him but we cannot let him move around. That being said, the risk for pneumonia in any scenario involving an extended period of time on bed rest, is almost absolute. 

In Jacob's case, a change in his heart rate is our usual indication of illness. That's not saying that a change in heart rate automatically suggests he's sick. But if breathing treatments and pain medications fail to bring it down then chances are he's fighting something off. His higher heart rate when sick is his heart compensating for the increase need for oxygen. You know, when people have trouble breathing their heart rate increases to pump blood (enriched with oxygen) more efficiently. To help him, he was put back on the BiPAP machine, which is nothing but positive pressure being pushed into his lungs. His HR on the BiPAP is 107-126 compared to off BiPAP where it's 145-155. 

Not exactly the direction we wanted to go in but we all knew it was inevitable. At some point, something had to give. Other than that, his dressing looks good. From what I understand, several layers were stitched closed and now he has steri strips on the surface of the closed hole (sounds so good to say that!) One of them already started to lift and that's not so great because that shouldn't be happening yet. Certainly not a horrible thing but not something we want happening at all this close to the surgery he just had. Nonetheless, all seems to be well with his site. Now we just need him to get better.