Day 3PM "The speed bump", Day 4 and Day 5AM

Sorry that I have not been able to keep you all updated on my status for the last two days but on Friday afternoon (Day 3) I hit a little bump in the road on my way to a healthy and speedy recovery.

The bump in the road was that one of my Lymphnode vessels was knicked during the surgery and as such I was leaking the fat from my milk into my chest cavity. The doctors were glad that they detected it as soon as they did and I am now on a special low fat formula and will be for anywhere from 4 to 10 weeks. I sure miss the good milk that my Mom makes for me. Dad kids with me that I am on the ultra slimfast diet. This is such a change for me since my goal up to surgery was to get as big as I could and now I'm on this fat free formula. I quess that's just how it goes sometimes and hopefully the little micro leak will heal soon and I can get back to my favorite food of choice.

Dad comforts me.
So I stayed in the CICU (Intensive Care) on Friday night so that the nurses could see if the special formula would help to clear things up. Friday night was a big night because my Mom got to hold me for a little bit and my Aunt Lauren and Uncle Jason stopped by to visit. It was not for very long but it was sooo nice to be held and to see my Aunt and Uncle. On Saturday AM the nurses and doctors were happy with the progress and felt that they could remove a few tubes. This was not a fun thing but it meant that I was close to moving out of intensive care and on to progressive care.

My Aunt and Uncle visit while I'm held by Mom.So on Saturday afternoon we made the big move up to the 9th floor where the CPCU (Cardiac Progressive Care Unit) is. I still had the right chest drainage tube in and I'm still on oxygen to keep my blood saturation levels up. The good news is that by being up on the 9th floor I don't have continual IV drips going and it's nice and quiet in our own private room. They allow us to have more visitors on the 9th floor - no more having to rotate to get everyone in. We are also able to all sleep in the same room at night which is very nice. On Saturday night my Mom and Dad got to hold me for a little bit longer than she did on Friday night. It was very soothing to be back in the arms of my parents. I think my parents liked it a little bit as well.

Dad holds me while Mom prepares my little nest in bed.
I ate well during the night and we all got some good rest. Sunday AM my G-ma and G-pa stopped by on their way back to Iowa. It was extreemly nice to have them around. It really meant a lot to me, my Mom and my Dad.

After I had my morning feeding I got to go for a little ride in my super sweet Radio Flyer wagon down to the chest x-ray lab. They want to look at my chest cavity to see if they can get this last chest tube out of me. Once the tube is out I will be able to be more mobile and can go on a few more wagon rides around the CPCU.

Hanging out in my cool red wagon.

I still have a few more tests to do today. One of these is another EKG to measure my hearts electrical workings. I would appreciate your prayers since the doctors want to do this test since there was a little conduction glitch that they saw in the last EKG that may need special attention and treatments. They have not seen anything in the continual monitoring of my heart beat that would suggest that anything is wrong. One doctor said that the previous EKG could be a miss reading and they want to run this EKG again to make sure that it's not a real problem. Thanks for you prayers that my heart does not have a conduction problem.

I must head back to bed to get some rest. I will need it if they pull more tubes out today. I feel like I have one foot out of this place and I'm that much closer to going home and completing my recovery.

Hello everyone! I feel better.

I love you all very much and hope to see you soon,
Lydia