Whistle while you work

Why, hello there!

Awake and not losing his mind!

When last we left our young hero, he had just started dialysis. In the last couple days he's made some solid progress. After a few adjustments to the particulars of his dialysis treatments, both his toxin and fluid levels have decreased. Unfortunately, he has become increasingly agitated, which is tough to deal with. All we can do is hold his head and/or hand and try our best to comfort him from his bedside... it's not very effective.

Just last night, however, his dialysis was put on hold because he had some leakage around his catheter site. There was more leakage again this morning, which brought all the troops to Ezekiel's room to assess his situation. Thankfully he's not showing any signs of infection, so they're hoping that the fluid is weeping from the scabbing around the catheter and not dialysis solution leaking through his abdominal wall. Just to be safe, though, they're not going to use the catheter until Friday in hopes that Ezekiel's body will take care of the issue. We will lose most of his progress from the 3 days of dialysis, but that's an acceptable sacrifice to prevent an infection.

On the lung front, decreasing Zeke's fluid overload has been great for his lungs. Today, he graduated from his oscillating ventilator to a conventional ventilator!

Jenny approves the ventilation change

There are several differences between these two types of ventilation, but all you need to know is that this a very good thing! It means his lungs have made great progress in his short time on this earth. It also means that we may be able to hold him soon! You may also notice in the picture above that his little hands are now being covered by socks, this is because he cannot be trusted. The little punk has been trying to pull out his breathing tube and his dialysis catheter. We obviously can't have that, so the cute little owl socks keep him in line.

Until next time!
Caleb