Harper has been doing well this weekend and the doctor today is remaining positive about it all even though I haven't been as much as I was previously. On Thursday and Friday, Harper's chest X-Ray showed accumulating fluid and very little was draining from her tube. Friday night, they adjusted her chest tube a little and 81mLs of fluid drained out followed by another 50 on Saturday. This was good and bad...
Good: Harper was much more comfortable when the fluid drained again. Her breathing slowed and pulse/oxygen increased. They reduced the flow on the nasal cannula and have kept it at 21% oxygen over the past day; which means she it is outputting room air and she is one step closer to getting most tape removed from her face! As for the fluid itself, the other good things is that the volume that has been removed over the past 48hrs, even though high, is much less when calculated as a volume drained over 5+ days, which is essentially is. This means that the feeding does not seem to be increasing the amount of chyle that is being produced, so she is closer to getting her IV's out, which decreases risk of infections. Yay!
Bad: The chest tube needs to be readjusted today. They are going to back it out a bit and then put it back in to try to get it in a better position. With any movement of this chest tube, there is an increased risk of infection, but it needs to be done. Also, they are going to have to take 2 or more X-rays in the process to make sure that it is in the correct place... those can't really be good to continually get each day.
Another bad, there is still fluid. Even though the volume is less... it is still there. So, it is just going to take time. Much more time. The doctor today seemed confident that the possibility of surgery was still a little ways off and was happy with the results thus far, but the possibility is still there and always in the back of our minds.
Overall... She is doing well. She is comfortable and smiling more each day! We haven't captured a picture of her smiling, yet, but it will be posted as soon as we get it!
On Friday, we got Harper's furniture all set up in her room at home, and with the help of family, got the yard straightened up a little and Harper's things organized. Friday night was my first night not sleeping in the hospital since July 13th - I slept on the couch at home with Crew and Buckeye. Karen stayed in Harper's room on the couch. Last night, Saturday, was our first night home together and I think it was restful for the both of us. It did feel weird coming home without Harper... Karen and I were home, but the house seemed empty despite the fact that Harper hasn't even been there, yet. We missed her - we thought about her the whole time we were there - we can't wait to bring her home... but it was good for us to get home and finally get a little sleep.
=W=
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