5-10-08

This is just not a good day. I have not felt good all day. So the doctor is not releasing me today. My blood pressure is still up even with the meds. They are going to watch it tonight and then decide if he wants to up the dosage or not or try something new. The good part of my day was all my family came to see me. I got to see my aunts and uncles and cousins. They did not do Blake's bath until 11:30 last night and even then it was a fast and furious one. They didn't even take off his hat. He was having a hard time breathing last night so they had to do it quickly because he struggles when he is on his back. Then the leads wouldn't pick up when they reattched them and they had to mess with them for about 15 minutes so I was very nervous the entire time. Oh and I guess his nurse was new because she had the charge nurse helping her the entire time and asking questions on what to do next. Robert and I were so sick to our stomachs because of it. She seemed to be knowledgeable in all his readings and everything just not on the protocall of how they do things and in what order. The good side to that is that they must have enough faith in Blake's stability that they would put a new nurse with him. I don't think she is new to nursing, just probably new to the hospital. Atleast I hope she isn't new to nursing. She was very sweet though and I had faith that God would take care of him and also knew that the charge nurse for the night was around at all times. Needless to say I am sure my bp was high as could be when we got back to the room so my nurse decided to wait to take it till after I had slept some. Guess that didn't make a differnce because it stayed elevated through the night and today even with all my meds. The doctor is going to try another round of Lasix to try and get rid of some of the fluids on his lungs because he still has a lot. The last round did not work but he said it might have been due to he was getting a blood transfusion at the same time. He is gaining about an oz every day and is at 1 lb 12 oz. He is also up to 8cc's of milk every three hours. The doctor also said that he is going to try and focus on developing Blake's growth because that will help with his lungs. It won't cure the fluid retention, but he does not want to mess with his cpap anymore or put it deeper in his esophagus because it can damage his lungs. He also does not want to give him too much lasix because that draws out his sodium with his urine and he would loose too much weight. So we are kind of at a stand still for now and it is just a waiting game. If there are any changes this evening I will update, otherwise I will just wait till tomorrow. I hope everyone has a great weekend. Thank you again so much for all your prayers and comments. I read all of them and it makes me feel so appreciative of all the friends and family that care so much. I know this is stupid but I am so worried that after a while people will begin to stop praying and that we will be forgotten about. I have seen that when something happens so suddenly the focus is on that issue for a short while and then it drifts away and people move on to other things. I just ask that not so much for me but for Blake everyone please keep him in your prayers. He will be here for another 12 weeks at least and still has a long way to go. Thank you thank you thank you for everything.

5-9-08

So the entire night I had nurses in and out watching my bp. It did not lower very much with the 200 mg so they gave me an immediate release of Procardia and that seemed to help lower it some. They gave me 10 mg instead of 5 of Ambien so that I could sleep. This morning at 7:00 am I was woken up to workmen remodling my hallway and were using the loudest possible materials they could find. They are not supposed to start working until 8:30. So many people complained, they finally stopped around 8:00 and I was able to go back to sleep. Then my doctor, lactation nurse, food delivery lady, nurses decided to drop in every other minute so that kept me awake over and over. I finally decided to get up at 9:00 because I was so hungy. By then my food was cold. lol So needless to say I am very tired today. My bp has been pretty good today except for one incident where I tried to take a "sit down" shower using the shower chair and I got really nauseaous and light headed and fell over and hit my head on the wall. Ouch! My mom and the nurse had to help me out and put me in bed. My doctor has told me that if my bp stays level today and tomorrow he will release me tomorrow afternoon sometime but only if it normalizes and stays that way. I am keeping my fingers crossed. Robert is on his way up here for the weekend. He has been gone working all week.
I got an update from one of the doctors today. Blake is on a roller coaster. The good news is his blood infection seems to be gone so they are taking him off the antibiotics today. He moves around so much he keeps rolling over on his cpap and cuttin off the oxygen flow so he then tries to breathe over it. Then he rolls back and it opens back up. They think the increase in apneas might be due to that so they have inserted the tubing further down in his airway to help out a little. Normally they keep it shallow because of his size but he has gained some wait so they think he can handle it better now. They are going up on his feedings again to 6 cc's. Yea we are now at a whole teaspoon. lol The bad thing is he has more fluid on his lungs than before. Because of that they are going to start him on some medicine called Lasix. The Lasix will help him pee out the extra fluid he is retaining and hopefully the extra fluid that is in his lungs as well. The downside to the meds is that he will lose a little bit of weight because of it. That is ok with me if his lungs get better. He has done good at gaining weight and has not lost any through out all his problems so we are ok with him losing a little bit now to help his lungs progress. Rob and I are going to go watch him get his third sponge bath this evening at 8:30 so I will update again after that.

5-8-08 Night

Well I might not be gettig out tomorrow after all. This evening when the new nurse came to check my vitals she took my bp and it had shot up to 175/119. UH OH so not good. so a call was put in to the doctor and they are going to give me 200 mg tonight so that I get a total of 300 in my system and starting tomorrow my dosage will be 200 mg twice a day. I just can not get a break. Everything was looking good and then whamo it shoots up high again. So anyway, I probably won't get much sleep tonight because they are going to be checking my bp every hour. Yippee. I will update tomorrow on if I will be residing here another night or not.

5-8-08

Blake had a good night last night. He only had two apnea spells, but then had a bunch in a row this morning. He had some thick mucus in the back of his throat so it was making it hard on him to breathe so the nurse suctioned it and he did better. He has had several spells today but is doing good. He keeps trying to flip himself out of his little sleeper that holds him in place. They have to put a gel pillow at the top of his head to keep him in place because he keeps pushing upwards with his legs and arms. Then when I was with him this morning he flipped himself up on his side and his nurse laughed and said he shouldn't be able to do that. He is being fiesty and shows he has his daddy's strength. His shoulders are very broad like Roberts. They said that if I had gone full term I might not have been able to push him out anyway since they are broad. He weighed in last night at 1 lb 11 oz. He is gaining weight yeah. The doctor moved him today up to 4 cc's of milk every three hours so we are progressing. His chest x-ray still shows his lungs really cloudy. The doctor said it is going to take some time for it to clear up, but with his pda closed it will help much more.
My blood pressure went up a little so I am back on one of my bp meds but only 100 mg instead of 300 mg. I feel much better today. I hope the doctor releases me tomorrow. It has been nice to be able to go over and see him whenever I want but I am racking up the charges being here. Anyway that is about it for today. Not a whole lot going on....that is a good thing. We are just hanging in here taking it day by day. Robert will be back here tomorrow after he gets done working. It is hard being away from him for a week but I know it is going to work out for us. God gave us an angel and he is becoming more and more beautiful every day. His poor lips and chin are so chapped from the tape that is holding his tubing in place. I feel so bad for him. Every time the respiratory therapist comes to suction him when I am there it makes me nervous. They take out all his tubing and he has to breathe completely on his own and he stresses out so they bag him a little giving him fresh air and then continue cleaning out all the mucus in his nose and mouth. Of course his bp drops and my heart jumps, but I know he will pull through it. Once they put the tubing back in he levels out and calms down. I do get to hold his little finger though when they do the suctioning and he squeezes it the entire time. He gets so upset but there is nothing I can do to help him. I just have to sit back and watch helplessly. I am falling more in love with him everytime I see him.

5-7-08

Sorry for not updating yesterday. I have been having a tough time. Monnday night I began having abdominal pains, high blood pressure and vomiting. My wonderful mom who has been taking care of me like no other took me to the emergency room. She called my doctor who called the ER and told them to take me directly upstairs to the labor and delivery unit. My liver enzymes were elevated again and I was relapsing. They started me on Magnisium which sucks because it makes you feel like you have the flue and I had already been vomiting so it made my nausea ten times worse so of course I began throwing up some more. They kept me on the Mag. for 24 hrs and just took me off this morning. I am now in a room in the postpartum area where I thought I would recover with no issues. I went and saw Blake this morning and began feeling bad so I came back to my room to lay down. Once in my room I laid down for a while and then tried to pump some milk for Blake. I began feeling dizzy and started having heart palps. We got the nurse and the next thing I knew I had four extra nurses and my doctor hovering over me. My blood pressure had bottomed out at 63/40 and continued to drop. My lungs started tightening and my asthma decided to kick in. So I had more blood taken, IV's going, breathing machine, you name it they were doing it to me. It took about three hours to where I was finally stable and my blood pressure came back up to 101/65. They took a chest x-ray sice I have had some fluid on my lungs and coughing when I lay down. So that is pretty much where I am at right now, lying in a hospital bed..AGAIN with MASSIVE gas pressure lol and hating every minute of it. My doctor took me off my bp meds for the day. The second bp med I am on is a time released one so it kicked in later in the day when I was already stable andtook my bp down farther than it should have making me have the attack I had. He is goig to monitor my bp w/out meds and we will see if my bp stays stable tonight and tomorrow w/out it. Keep your fingers crossed that it does. The doctor said that since I had developed such a severe case of preeclampsia, it is possible for me to relaps more than once so I am going to have to be very careful and get plenty of rest throughout the day. Hopefully I will get released from the hospital in the next couple days.

Ok Blake...the sweet baby boy. His doctor told us that his echo showed that his PDA has closed. YEAH! NO SURGERY. He said that it could re-open any time, but for now it is closed. As of right now his blood culture has not grown any new bacteria yet, but he is still on his antibiotics just in case. Let's see. I didn't get to see him all day Tuesday since I was doped up in a hospital bed. But Tuesday night around 11:30pm my nurse and mom took me up to the NICU to watch his nurse give him a sponge bath. So me my nurse and my parents (oh yea my dad flew back in since I relapsed. Such a worrier lol..that's a parent right) I had so many wires, tubes and things attached it took everyone to wheel me up there and hang on to all the tubes. lol
His bath-He did not like it at all. He got so mad his head started to turn purple. He cried (well his little whimper that he lets out) and he scruntched his eyes all up and threw his hands and legs around. My first instinct was to pick him up and hold him but I knew I couldn't so I sat there helpless. I gave him my finger to hold when she got done and he calmed right down. I started to talk to him and he opened his eyes up and looked back at where my voice was coming from. I thought he was just doing it just because but the nurses there told me that he could hear where it was coming from and was looking towards me even if he couldn't see me yet. They bumped his feedings up to 2cc's yesterday and today to 3cc's every 3 hrs since he is tolerating the milk so well. Yes I am pumping...totally thought it would weird me out but it's not so bad. Kinda of natural now. He has gained some weight on his face so he does not look as much like a little old man now. He is still having apnea spells.
This morning Tiffany and I went and saw him and while his nurse was changing him, his ambilical cord fell off. It looks like a little dried up raisin. lol He had an apnea spell while I was sitting there and I panicked once his heart rate didn't pick back up so I tapped him on the bottom a few times and he began to breathe again. His nurse had stepped out really quick to put up the milk I gave her. I know I should have waited a little bit longer so that she or another nurse could see bc she wasn't gone but a few seconds but my mommy instincts kicked in and I panicked. I tried really hard to wait but I freaked when his heart rate went into the 80's. After that is when I started to feel bad and we went back to my room where my blood pressure decided to bottom out. Since his PDA is closed we will hopefully start seeing some progress with his lungs. Keep the prayers coming, they are helping more than you know!
I added the pictures from his bath to the Photobucket account. There are pics from my camera and from my mom's. Speaking of, my mother has been so wonderful. She has put her career on hold so that she can take care of me, because Robert has to work back in Houston during the week. She has done everything from doing my laundry to cleaning my milk pumps. She has not gotten any sleep trying to take care of me and I feel so guilty because of it. THANK YOU MOM if you read this. I would be in a lot of trouble if she wasn't here helping me. I know one thing. Blake is going to be one spoiled little boy by his grandparents and parents.

5-5-08

Well I spent a lot of time today with Blake. He was very good today. He held my finger just about the entire time I was there. He kept burping up bubbles of air out of his feeding tube. (he has gas lol) He only had one Apnea spell while we were there, but he brought himself out of it. He is doing good learning to pull himself back on his own and they are not very long either. It is scary because the nurse has to watch for a few seconds to see if he will breathe on his own and hnow long it lasts. If it goes too long then she steps in. Kelly is day nurse said they have to wait so that they can see how he is handling them and then they chart it. Right before we left he let us know his diaper needed to be changed and that he was wet. He squirms a lot when he is wet so the nurse changed him. Since she was messing with him she went ahead and did his vitals that they do every three hours. When she finished she rolled him on his left side for us to see him a little better and he opened his eyes half way to where he was squinting. He kept reaching out trying to grab on to something so I put my hand in the incubator a little bit in front of him and he found my fingers and grabbed a hold of one and began squeezing it. He would squeeze then let go and squeeze and let go. He was getting his work out. He kept running his hand up and down my finger checking it out. My mom made me leave for a little so that I could rest. I get exhausted even just sitting next to him in a chair, but I would stay there all day if they would let me. The attending doctor for the day called me with an update on Blake. He said that he felt like the medicine for the PDA is working. He did not really hear a murmur today, (YEAH!) so he ordered a Echo to be done in the morning tomorrow and they will check to see if the PDA is closing like he thinks it might be. I am praying it is. No word yet on if his blood infection is gone or not, but he is still being treated with antibiotics just in case. The doctor said his blood pressure is holding good and if his PDA is smaller they will start working on his nutrition and will up his milk intake to where it should be. That is it for right now. We have had a good day. I am very tired and my back has been hurting today. I have also been trying to go longer before taking my pain meds. So after I rest we will go back and see him this eveing. We appreciate all the prayers and so does Blake.

First Week

Well we have had busy week this week. Since last Saturday Blake has been fighting like a champ. He was on a breathing tube up till Wednesday where they then took him off and put him on a Cpap which goes in his nose and gives him air. He has to breath on his own but sometimes rides the vent when he gets tired. His lungs are still very clouded and week. He has had many challenges this week but has over come all of them and so have I. They finally got my blood pressure somewhat under control using two different meds and released me on Wednesday. We have sinced moved in to the Ronald McDonald House here in Austin which is a just a few miles away from the hospital. The best hospital we could have asked for! Their NICU is ranked one of the best in Texas and the US. We have been very blessed. It was deffinitely a GOD thing that brought us here. I will be staying here in Austin for the next 15 weeks until he is released. Robert had to go back home this weekend to work but my mom has been staying with me to help out. I kind of overdid it the other night when Rob and I went to see Blake. I was under the impression that once the baby was delivered the Preeclampsia went away, but apparently that is not the case. While we were walking up my blood pressure bottomed out twice and I almost passed out. Luckily Robert caught me and the night shift officer that was next to us grabbed a wheel chair and put me in it. They took me back to L&D where I was readmitted and my vitals ran and blood taken to check everything out. My doctor released me but said I had to rest which I hate doing. He told Robert that the Preeclampsia and Toximia would take 6 weeks to leave my system and that my body would not heal from the c-section for 6 weeks as well. So I am being forced to do a lot less than I would like to. It takes me forever just to walk anywhere. I look like a little old lady waddling around. LOL

So about Blake....sorry...I am trying to give updates on us both. The last couple days he has developed a blood infection which they are treating with two of the strongest antibiotics they have. His PDA (Patent ductus arteriosus) which is a bipass out of the heart between that pushes blood between the body and the lungs that should close at birth has since opened way up. It is supposed to clamp down allowing blood to flow to the body and lungs seperately. It is not doing that. With is being opened the blood is bipassing the lungs and going to the body. This is making it harder for him to breathe and his lungs are cloudy. They have given him three rounds of medicine to try and shrink it down so that it will close on its own. We will know in the next couple days if it has worked or not. If it does not he has to have surgery where they will open him up and fix it. Since he is so small they call him a Mircro-Preemie. He is the smallest and youngest baby in the NICU. He is also beginning to have Apnea where he forgets to breathe and his heart rate drops drastically. He sometimes brings himself out of it but most the time he has to have someone tap him a few times to stimulate his breathing. He is a fighter though. He is very strong and pushes himself up off the bed. He loves to sleep on his belly all tucked up in a ball with his legs underneath him. He likes to feel contained so they use a little blanket to contain his bottom and one strap that goes over his backside to make it feel like someone is holding him down. I am not aloud to touch him for too long. He can only have so much stimulation before it stresses him out so all I can do is put my hand on his backside or let him hold my finger.

I got to help change his diaper yesterday which is too big for him so they have to fold it in half and tuck it in. He opened both his eyes for the first time yesterday. He was just opeing his right eye but has not gotten both eyes open. He looks like a little old man. I have gotten to hear him cry...well try to, it sounds more like a little whimper. His blood pressure has been pretty good for a baby that has such a large PDA and so has his O2 levels. They are not fluctuating too much which is a good thing.

We ask that everyone keep praying for our little family..especially Blake. We really appreciate everyones cares and concerns. We are just going day by day and praying that GOD will heal our son and make him better. The doctors say that he is very fiesty for a micro and is a fighter. Just like his Daddy. We have the most wonderful doctors ever! Oh the second day that they changed his diaper, he peepeed on the nurse and then grabbed his crotch...again just like his daddy. LOL He does not like his diaper changed, but apparently liked his little sponge bath last night. The nurses said he was wide awake the entire time. He does not have really any hair right now but the hair he does have is bleech blonde. We will see if it changes. He has also gained several ounces and is now 1 lb 8 oz. YEAH! He is taking 1 ml of breast milk every three hours, but has been pushed back to every 6 hours due to his heart PDA.

I apologize for the first two blogs being so long. I am trying to put a weeks worth of info in two little blogs and it is hard.

On the right side under LINKS is a link to pics (Blake Daniel Pokluda Photo Album) that we will be updating constantly on photobucket. Please feel free to go there and see how he is coming along.