Not-So Baby Ethan Update

So, just a small update on the family!

Three days ago Tia went under the knife to have an abdominal hernia repaired. Hafter having two somewhat large children, things like this happen! Immediately following her surgery she started going downhill. Severe headaches, severe nauseousness, sever pain...everywhere. She was completely bed ridden for 2 days. Finally at about 3 am yesterday morning, she decided that all this throwing up could threaten the integrity of the repair and the mesh holding everything in place. So her and her stepmom went down to the Valley General Hospital emergency room (I was at work). At 7:30am I get the call that she is going in for a CT Scan. At 8:30, I get another call saying that she is going to be admitted.

She checked herself in at 3am and the first doctor didn't come to see her until 5:30pm...like, in the evening! FYI, Valley Hospital is the EXACT SAME company as Deaconess. And I think we all know how we feel about Deaconess.

The doctor came in and talked to her for like 6 minutes, he sounded really confused on why she was there and gave us the impression that she didn't even need to be there. We beg to differ! He then, real abruptly, kind of meandered out of the room. In the middle of the conversation. He didn't say good bye, didn't say he'd be back, didn't say he was going to go check something...or whatever. He just didn't say anything...just left. The nurse came in and asked what his thoughts were. We were stumped, he didn't tell us anything! He did mention an OB-GYN consult (not quite sure why). But after the OB did a seriously painful pelvic exam, he determined that she either has cysts on her fallopian tubes, or Pelvic Inflamation Disease contracted from the surgery. He also said that there is a chance she could remain an inpatient for up to 4 days. If the antibiotics are not helping her in 4 days, then another surgery might be in close pursuit. That will mean she will still be inpatient when I start school on Monday...and I still have to juggle everything else. At this point I had to go to bed. It was after 7pm, and I had to get up by 9:15 to leave by 9:30. Yes, I slept at the hospital in my work clothes...eew!

I will know more when I go see her today. The stupid thing about all this is, her hospital is in the Spokane Valley, Ethan's hospital is in downtown Spokane which are probably a good 20 minutes apart in this dumb weather we are having.

In any case...more prayers please!

Take care for now.

- Kip, Tia, Riley, and Baby E -

Baby Ethan Update - 12/31/08

Ok, so I know I told you I would write when he moved...and I didn't!
Just know, the move went really well, Medstar came late, it took like 25 minutes to drive 6 blocks, and then the intake was like 4 1/2 hours long. But all in all, he is at a better hospital with a much better staff.

For those of you who wish to visit him, he in on L2E (Lower Level 2 - East), room 211. You don't need to sign in, you don't need permission, you can just go right in. When you get to the pediatrics unit, he is the last door on the right across from the nurses station. You don't even need to tell the nurses who you are, really!

In any case, he was doing a lot better. We were able to get him from a continuous feed up to a bolus feed which is more desirable for his situation. He was doing really good with that until he decided that he would start having his watery stool again. We did find out that he has a class 3 allergy to pork (I guess class 3 is the highest/worst), which his Pancreacarb (his miracle enzymes) is a pork derivative. So we quickly stopped using those (even though he was having no adverse effects from it), and put him on these vegetable enzymes that we can only get a Huckleberries and insurance, nor the hospital, will cover at this point. So now we are stuck with paying for these enzymes out of pocket. $11 for 60 pills, 60 pills are only good for just under 7 days. And these are supposedly the enzymes he will use for the rest of his life. This is going to get expensive!!!

So, making a long story short, we still don't know when he is going home, we still don't know why he is having such bad liquid stool, we don't know why he is getting this serious butt rash that he has. We have gone through like 3 different g-tubes and nothing has seemed to work. Everything we try just keeps leaking around the tube at the insertion site. We started out with a bard g-tube. We took that out and put a foly cathiter in. This is a urinary cathiter that is smaller in diameter that was inserted in it's place in hopes that the site will shrink down around the smaller cathiter. We will then take the cathiter out and put the g-tube back in making a tighter fit. That was the idea. So after a couple days with the cathiter in, the surgeon decided that it was time to put the g-tube back in. Instead of using the bard, he decided that a Mickey was a better choice of g-tube for Ethan. It took only a couple days to find out that this g-tube was also leaking perfusely around the site. The decision was made to have radiology take the Mickey out and put in what is called a GJ-tube. This is a tube that bypasses the stomach and goes directly into his upper small intestine, it is called the jejunium. We did that yesterday, and now he is "frothing" at the insertion site. We are all so confused on what is going on, so we decided to take him back down to radiology today to see if posibly the tube was placed wrong, or something else is malfunctioning. No results as of yet!

Prayers are still needed for this feeding issue. Nobody seems to know why he can't keep his food in. Also, we need prayers for controlling the acide levels of his stool to reduce the sevarity of his butt rash. We also would like prayers that he will be able to come home soon. Once he is on a feeding regiment that works, home is just right around the corner. Prayer for Tia as she is sitting behind me right now, trying to put her clothes on by herself in the recovery room after her hernia surgery. And a lot more paryers, but I think I should go help her get dressed. She is wincing and moaning. I am such a bad boyfriend right now!

Love you all!

Take care for now,

- Kip, Tia, Riley, and Baby E -