Big Step Towards Recovery

Caelin had a very good Thursday night. Mommy woke up at 1:00 and saw he was awake so she stayed up for a little while singing and talking to him until he went back to bed. Daddy and Mommy woke up this morning at 6:00AM and decided to head home to shower, swap clothes, and say hi to the pups before Caelin got his chest closed. Yesterday, the surgeon's assistants stopped by to tell us the surgery would start between 9 and 10, so we figured we had plenty of time. As we were leaving, Cael woke up slightly and we told him we love him, are proud of him, that he is the strongest person we know, and that we would see him later. Unfortunately the stuff at home took a little longer than expected and of course there was traffic on the way back to the hospital. We arrived at 8:55 and they already had his room set up and the surgeon had just walked into his room. We were too late to give him one last kiss or see him one last time before he got his chest closed. :( We felt incredibly guilty about this. We kept reminding ourselves of how remarkable he is, but we just did not want him to be scared or feel alone. Dr. Chai ended up following us to the waiting room as we were directed away from his room- he explained the procedure would take approximately 30 minutes and is relatively straightforward.

At about 9:50 AM Dr. Chai came into the waiting room and told us the procedure was successful and there were no surprises or complications and that Caelin did awesome. This was another huge step that our little warrior triumphed over. We were allowed back in his room around 10:25 AM and Caelin looked great. His color was pretty good, he was sleeping comfortably, and his incision was stitched beautifully. His day continued this trend of positive recovery milestones. Caelin's on only 40% oxygen, he was completely taken off Epinephrine, his lactate is down to 0.8 from 11.1, his blood gasses were pushed back from being taken every 2 hours to every 4 hours, his chest tube is drying up, he is making the right amount of urine, his swelling is going down, and overall his statistics are looking great. He has been pretty heavily medicated all day to keep him comfortable and this has enabled his body to rest, which is what he needs. He tried to wake up at several different points and he stayed awake for a few minutes in some instances, but we tried to get him to go back to sleep because his body needs the rest.

We cannot express enough how proud we are of Caelin's strength, determination, resilience, and progress. He still has a very long unpredictable road with many hurdles to travel and over come, but he has already come so far so fast, we are confident he will continue to take the obstacles head on and overcome them- We have quickly observed that it is a big part of his personality. :)