Day 5 of Second Cold 2009

We are officially a sickhouse. I think it's safe to say that everyone in the house is sick to some extent. Owen and Alexander have been sick since Sunday. I came down with a sore throat and no other symptoms. I thought that it was just allergies or sensitivity to environmental factors. I get sore throats A LOT! So I didn't think much of it until yesterday when my nose started to run. Today I'm full of all sorts of thick mucous (gross huh!). Tim is sick with a bit of a cough and he says he's tired, but overall pretty good.

Alexander is the WORST! Poor little guy is absolutely miserable. He and Owen have awful crunchy coughs and runny noses. Owen says his throat is sore, and Alexander keeps holding his head and saying ow..ow! Alexander got up this morning, drank some milk, coughed up a lung and went back to sleep for three hours. He got up was awake through lunch, but wouldn't eat lunch, then went back to sleep for an hour! Alexander had a fever this morning too! 39.1 when he woke up! Since then we have been keeping Tylenol into him. Throughout the day he has been running 38.1-38.3. Alexander LOVES CPT, so we did lots of CPT today! It's good for him! By tonight he had perked up a bit, hoping tomorrow is a better day for him. We'll continue with the CPT because it seems to make him feel better.

Owen is still coughing and is still pretty sick, but at least he is eating and drinking a bit. He hasn't been as tired as Alexander, but he has still been pretty tired. Owen hasn't had a "fever" yet. He is running a little higher than normal, but not technically a fever. He should be on the mend, although he still has a nasty cough and runny nose!

Kaitlyn: ahhhhh Kaitlyn. Well, lets see. She woke up Tuesday night fussing. Usually when this happens she wants to be rolled over or has gas in her tummy that needs to be manually vented. (We leave her tummy vented all night long, but sometimes air still gets trapped!) So I rolled her on her back. I tried manually venting her stomach, but no air would come out. Kaitlyn gave her face like she had secretions or something she needed suctioning. So I suctioned her mouth and didn't get anything really, was reaching to turn off the suction machine when she spit-up!!! Kaitlyn has a nissen!!! How can she spit-up!

Anyway, back in with the catheter I went I suctioned until I got the worst out. Then I whipped the bi-pap off. If there were formula in the airway I didn't want it getting pushed any further into the lungs! I then aspirated her stomach.....I wasn't going to risk having any more food in there until I could figure out what caused her to spit-up. While waiting for her tummy to drain I continued suctioning. The amount of formula in her stomach was astonishing. Her sats were only 1-2 % lower than normal but she was just starting to dip a bit when I felt that her stomach was done draining. I coughed her several times and she came back up pretty fast. When I was done she was holding 96-97%. After CPT and more coughs I put her back on Bi-pap. She had 120mLs drain out of her stomach (which I had to dump), there was 10 mLs left in her stomach plus however much she spit-up!! Kaitlyn sleeps with a rate of 60mLs an hour. For some reason she stopped digesting her food!

Wednesday we had a hard time getting food into her. She wasn't tolerating a very high rate at all. I think that I got most of her day's formula into her, but I had to leave out her solids. Last night we started her out at a rate of fifty, but she wasn't digesting fast enough, so we had to bump her down to 40 mLs an hour. Today she wasn't processing very fast AT ALL. I think I might have gotten about 40 mLs an hour into her, that's about half the rate that she would typically get with solids. Now it's been two days without solid foods. Not a huge loss in calories, but still worrisome when I don't know how long this is going to continue. Also worrisome because of the loss in fluids. Today Kaitlyn also got up with increased secretions. There is some thicker stuff coming out of her nose today. Overall she doesn't look too bad, except for the digestion. Her sats are 1-2 % lower than normal. She is dipping into the low nineties during coughs and when she cries (something she only does when something's up). Tonight she is sleeping comfortably and we have her rate down to 40 mLs an hour. Hopefully she'll have a good night.

Well wishes going out to Lizzy's family and Mary's family. We hope everyone is well soon! Keep us updated folks, we'll be thinking of you all!