Ready for home!

That is the face of a little boy that is READY to get home! We all are ready to be back to normal.

All of the children are doing great. The boys at home are feeling well. They are still coughing that icky cough and have runny noses but no fevers for a week now!

Roo has been off of O2 all morning and has been staying above 95% so that is wonderful! He has to be monitored for 24 hours after off of O2 so tomorrow if all goes well we will be going home.

As I typed that I had to change a poopy diaper. I found blood in his stool so that got sent off to lab. I pray it is nothing more than irritation from all the passing of the stool from swallowing a lot of mucous. Please pray with me that it is nothing serious!

I am going to nap before heading home to watch our boys so daddy can go to work tonight.

We are so ready for us to be out of here!

From the land of nod

***UPDATE***

Roo ended up desatting last night and his O2 was started again. He may be staying over night again today. It isn't a terrible thing that he is desatting, it is just basically that he still has so much gunk in his chest and nasal cavities that he is not getting enough room air into his system.

Other than that he looks GREAT. His color is wonderful, he is able to cough up a lot of the stuff from his chest. He has had great intake and output. (feeding and diapers :)). He sounds wonderful and is even starting to "talk" a little here and there. Such a wonderful sound!

I will keep you updated as we progress throughout this day. Thank you for all your prayers. We have NOT been doing this on our own!

***Original Post***

We are still alive and getting better by the day. We have been told that Roo could go home as early as tomorrow. They are trying to wean him off of oxygen. As of now he is on so little that it shouldn't really make a difference, but it does. When they take him completely off he desats (his oxygen level goes down too low) after about 45 min. So he is still working too hard to do it all on his own and there is still too much build up in his chest that he can't seem to get past.

As I am typing this our nurse came in and turned his oxygen completely off so we will see if he can maintain his own levels.

On the home front the boys are making a great recovery. They have not had fever in about 5 days. They still have a cough and a runny nose but NOTHING like what it was. They are not as hoarse as before and the snot is clear.

I went home to be with our older guys this morning and it was a great joy to be with them. I am running on VERY LITTLE sleep and I am feeling it catching up with me. I showered, & cleaned our house while I was home and played with the guys. I gave the boys their own little chores to get done and while Bear was bringing laundry into the laundry room he looked at me and smiled and said "I am sooo happy". Sheer joy cannot even begin to explain my feeling! "I am glad you are happy Bear. I am so very glad!"

I brought my camera up to the hospital to keep Roo's time up here documented in pictures. While I was going through the pictures I found a fun surprise... J had taken some pictures of them playing "dress-up" the other day.

He has been a GREAT partner and support during this time. I cannot say that my house has stood a chance against my guys at home but they are doing great together! He has been coming up with so many fun things for the boys to do to take their mind off of being home for SO long and so long without their mommy. When I went home our furniture was all turned over and sleeping bags strewn over the tops... it was a major fort area. I just laughed.

Bear has been acknowledging his "boo-boo's" more and needs kisses to heal the pain. I have kissed more bumped heads, scraped knees, squished fingers than I can count but last night I encountered a first and an unforgettable. We were playing on the floor in the front room I was on my hands and knees chasing the boys around the floor. Bear fell and hit his bottom on the corner of their rocking chair.

OH YEAH it happened... he comes crawling backwards toward my face. I look up to see his bottom right in my face and hear the sweetest words for the most awful request "kiss it Mommy". I bust out laughing and he is continuously stuffing his rear in my face trying to get me to kiss it. At one point he looks between his legs at me and says "KISS IT MOMMY!" So I swallowed my pride and kissed his tiny hiney!

**as it has taken me about 5 hours off and on to write this Roo has been off of his O2 for just as long. He is maintaining his sats with room air. If this keeps up over night we will be discharged to go home tomorrow.** Praying for a GREAT NIGHT!

Update

Hello from the pit of sickness! Thank you Holly for filling in for me and updating on our puny family. You are precious!

We have all been kind of just bobbing around in the rough sea lately, or so it feels. We are battling a sickness that won't really show it's face to knock it out or even show a sign of when it is leaving making it REALLY hard to be optimistic about us all being well again!

I know that "this too shall pass" and I TRULY believe that. I am just having trouble seeing past the HUGE obstacles to allow the passing! Maybe it's the fogginess of my brain as I can barely function.

I feel so awful and even worse that I cannot do for my children the way they need me right now. I have been faking it and slaving away still at all the mother/wife duties in our household that need tending. But the faking has caught up with me. There is no more faking when it just runs out of your nose and you can't just keep "sucking it up"! It is time to face facts... I AM SICK! I HATE that I am sick. I am supposed to take care of the sick, right? RIGHT!

Anywho, I took Roo up to the ER last night because he was not breathing right. He has been sneezing and coughing a little but yesterday progressively it was getting worse. He was no longer able to "cough it up" and/or breathe past the blockage. He was gasping for air and that is a sight I wish I never knew. I Cannot stand watching a baby not being able to breathe. Then he started running a fever and his cries were getting faint. I told J... "I will not be able to rest with him acting like this", so I took him to the ER.

And there I sat with a gasping infant for over an HOUR. He was working super hard to breathe and his chest was caving in due to the struggle. GREAT SERVICE! His heart rate was and still remains in the 180-220's. Not good. We finally got a room to stay at 3 this morning. I finally fell asleep by 5A and then woke again at 8. I have been running on... well, prayer. Thank YOU! I feel that the boys are "enduring well" too due to all the prayers on our behalf. Again, Thank you!

Roo has been "breathing too fast" to feed. They have him on an IV drip of fluids. He has been doing great as far as sleeping through the "trauma" that he has to endure when they have to suction his nose and run tubes in the back of his nasal cavities to break up the "stuff", give him breathing treatments and an oxygen cannula in his nose. I take him from his bed with all his wires and just snuggle him in my arms on the reclining chair, resting as much as humanly possible with a precious babe sleeping in your lap.

So far J and I are taking turns caring for the others at home. He has forfeited driving for UPS for the time it takes for Roo to come home therefore he will be working at night, going in at 6 for appx 4 hours a night.

I will come home at about 4:30 to help get kids cleaned up and dinner served (We have lots of precious friends that have stepped in to help again by providing meals, and it is SUCH A BLESSING as we feel we are steadily sinking trying to stay focused on who needs what now... AND KEEPING IT ALL LOGGED FOR FOSTERING!).

In the time I am home with my boys I will bathe them and put them to bed, take myself a shower and then rest until J comes home to relieve me so that I can go back up to be with Roo. Tonight I came home to be with the guys, leaving Roo in the care of the hospital NICU staff. It felt so good to come home and see their faces light up and call out to me climbing into my lap for loving on. Oh how I cannot wait for them to be better! ALL OF THEM!

While we have had LOTS of offers to come watch the boys OR sit with Roo, we are not able to accept those kind offers due to the fact that Roo is highly contagious and the boys seem to NOT be getting any better... EVEN on the amoxicilin. I couldn't chance others getting sick trying to help us out. BUT THANK YOU ALL THE SAME! We love you and covet your prayers. REALLY! We could SO not do this without you!