Day 19 - Samuel Update

The last few days have been a little rocky for Samuel. A couple of nights ago he started having apnea spells where he would altogether stop breathing. Each time that he would stop breathing, they had to "bag him" which means they had to take his cpap off and put a mask over his nose and mouth and squeeze an oxygen bag to pump his lungs with air to get him breathing again. That process mimicks mouth to mouth or basically, the conventional ventilator which he had previously graduated from. His ph levels in his blood where not normal as well and so they put him back on the ventilator. He did pretty well on it but he would still have a lot of "desats" which is where the oxygen saturation of his blood would drop. The oxygen saturation is measured in percent and generally 90-100% is where we like to see the numbers. So, to make a long story short, they put him back on the cpap to see how he would do after getting a blood transfusion lastnight (he is still anemic). The doctor was stating that he is doing better today than yesterday. He thinks that the apneas were occuring due to the anemia, infection (even though the bloodwork isn't showing any infection), and/or congestive heart failure. He is not at room air on the cpap right now and is still "desatting" a lot so they are trying to figure out what is going on with him. We don't like not knowing what is going on but we pray that the doctor's will be able to figure it out and that Samuel will pull through this. I hope that all made sense. Here are a few pictures of Samuel a couple of days ago, after they put the ventilator back on. They gave him a good shampoo the other day and his hair is kind of light to medium blonde:) Poor little was so tired that day and had been through so much.

Oh, and as of lastnight, he weighs 2 lbs 12 oz. I don't know how accurate that is but he's gained a half pound since birth! Oh, and they stopped his feedings after the apneas a couple nights ago but they started him up again on the feedings yesterday evening. He is having a couple or so bowel movements a day with the help from suppositories so his bowels seem to be working okay for now. So we'll see how everything else plays out.