Friday, July 22, 2005

Friday July 22, 2005 Zack was fever free for over 24 hours but his white blood count was up to 15. Dr Van Meter and Dr. Neff (ID) came by and said that they weren’t really worried about his count being up as long as he didn’t run a fever also. They will continue to treat his infection with Linezolid for another 2 weeks to be sure they have gotten it all.

At 8:00 Am Dr. Mutchnick says he wants another CAT scan today to check for fluid on his brain. He wants to be sure that there was no Neurological reason that Zack is not responding to hand commands. I was relieved that the CAT scan was unchanged. He also had a chest x-ray (no change) and an EEG (haven’t gotten the results back yet). At 3:30 Dr Rodriquez places the feeding tube in his stomach. He is sedated and given morphine. The procedure comes off without a hitch and by 6:00 PM the sedative has worn off and Zack opens his eyes. It is so wonderful to see him with no tubes in his nose or mouth and to stare into those big brown eyes with ridiculously long eyelashes. At 7:00 I stepped into the hallway outside the ICU door to talk with some visitors. Then the nurse at the front desk paged me and said that Neika (day nurse) and Stephanie (night nurse) wanted me in his room. I was worried that something was wrong but everyone said it was good. The lights were on in his room and several of the nurses were surrounding his bed. I watched as they told him to close his eyes, keep them closed, now…open them. He followed all of their commands several times. It was very exciting. I have felt that he had been trying to communicate with his eyes and now he was doing it. Dave Stone and Sadie came by soon thereafter and Scott and I were still high off the experience. It seems strange to get such of out of a simple act like closing and opening his eyes. The only way to explain it is to think back to when he was a tiny baby and remember how we delighted in each new talent. I can imagine that’s what it will be like for the next several months. Zack and I shared a very touching moment late tonight. He was very relaxed with no tension in his arms. I took his hand and touched his face with it. He watched me intently and held tightly to my hand. When I would stop he would raise our hands towards his face and I would help him caress his cheek. We were both so content and I felt extremely blessed to be there. Please pray that all goes well during morning rounds and his doctor signs the order to move to the critical care unit. Then after 24 hours it’s off to Frazier. Also pray that in the last few days here I will have opportunities to share with other families here how prayer got us through this tough situation. I can’t wait to see what tomorrow brings and how God will bless us and use this to glorify Him!