Cath results....

OK, sorry it took us so long. We didn't get to come back to see Tuck until after 9pm. This is the jest of things. They took down 3 vessels by coiling them. They really thought there were going to be more than that but weren't. They got to measure the pressure in Tuckers left atrium, which is still high. The wetness of the lungs is the back up from the left side of the heart, which they knew was happening but now they know the extent of it. The pressures are coming down, they were in the 30's now they are in the 20's. These results just mean that the left side of the heart is still very stiff and TIME....time is what it will take. Again, we don't know how much of that will involve this hospital stay and what will not. We were very happy to learn that it wasn't something more wrong in the heart requiring some other action, like an additional surgery or valve problem. Just time.

We can move forward to extibation at whatever rate Tucker is ready. I am not sure what that means exactly. I have a big list for rounds tonight with questions. Todd and I need to make a decision on how we are going to handle this stay for a longer period. I believe it will involve a switch off, one at home and one here, then switch again. Hunter will be starting school, the house needs up keep, we have jobs that need to be tended too as well. All things that cannot be on hold for months and months, if that is what it is going to take. (I don't know that is what it will take, if it is we will deal with it and do it the very best way we can...but we need a plan now, different than our original one)

Optimology showed up today (finally). They dilated Tuckers eyes and did some "scrapings". (yeah OUCH!!) They sent them for cultures. So far they are saying he has ulcers on his eyes from not closing all the way for so long. The nurses are to use drops every hour on them-it is a refrigerated antibiotic drop. Optimology will be by every day until the eyes are back to normal. I didn't get to talk to them. They did this right as he came back from cath lab and paralyzed him so they could do all the eye cultures without him moving around on them. (this was part of the reason it took so long for us to be able to see him when he got done with cath...that and the DIGGING exploration for new iv ports---yeah even the head was tried)

Tonight we are mentally exhausted. We were so hopeful that there would be lots of vessels to close off and that it would be a miracle fix, off the vent and home all in the same few weeks. Maybe that will still happen, maybe it wont.

Time......Tucker time!!!! We know this yet try to do things on our time only to relearn this lesson again and again. Everything Tucker has done thus far in life is on his terms, his time.....and this too will be done on his terms...his time.