Getting ready to leave, we hope.

Today is Sunday. We are suppose to be going home tomorrow. They're taking us for a chest xray, echo cardiogram, and lab work first thing in the morning tomorrow, and if all is well, we're on our way. Dr Ategie, I think that's how you spell it, told us that there is already a stenosis, a narrowing in a vessel, at the site of suture. This means that in at least 8 weeks, we hope we can hold out that long, before we have to come back and have angioplasty. If they do it any sooner that that, they might tear the suture site. So God be with our little man in his time of need. We are praying that things go well, and with God on our side, we will prevail.

After my post yesterday, and the mom stressing the fact that the ET tube should come out. They took it all. The chest tubes, the ET tube, the NG tube, their almost all gone. They have dropped us down to 1/2 a liter of O2, the they've started us on the methadone Q every 6 hours, to get us off of the fentanal (not really sure that's how you spell it). That's funny how they have to give you more drugs to get you off of other drugs. Regardless, his eyes have been rolling in the back of his head. Good thing, he's only been up since 200am. Time to sleep sweet prince.

aaaaaaauuuuugggghhhhh!!!!!!!!

Today is July 19, 2010. It is our son's 3 month Birthday, and I'm having to look at him with his ET Tube still in place. For those of you that don't know what an ET Tube is, this is the tube that they put down your throat to help you breath. We were really hoping that today we would be loosing that darn thing, but they are reasuring me that it just takes time. Though he's been breathing over that machine for at least the last three to four days. They all start to run together when you start to spend this much time in a hospital.
We did loose all three of our chest tubes today. I guess I should be thankful that we are at least moving in a positive direction. I just really miss holding our son, as well as Chad does too. He is such a great father to our son. Chas, lights up everytime he hears his fathers voice. Chad, had daddy duty this past weekend, and he did it without a fight. This is when you get to sit at the hospital and just wait, because there is nothing else that you can do. I am truely blessed to have found him.

Chad and I found each other in March 2009. We hit it off right off the bat. Yes, I have to confess that I asked him out. I was not feeling well about this guy that was hitting on me, so I asked Chad to act like he was my boyfriend. As you can tell he had no problem with that. We were together about six months when we found out that we were pregnant. I didn't think this was possible so this was a great feeling for the both of us. We then decided that marriage would be our next step. Yes, again I asked Chad to marry me. We were married November 14, 2009 at daddy and Heather's house. With a reception to follow at my Grandmother's. For a wedding to be put together in a matter of 2 weeks, I must say that Heather and her friends did a beautiful job. The reception was a big hit as well. Kathi, Cheryl, Barbara, Amanda, Carrie, and many other friends helped with that.
After many long months of being big and pregnant, 37 weeks to be exact, we found out that our son was going to born with a heart defect. This defect is called Shone's Complex or Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrome. This condition is a combination of multiple defects on the left side of his heart. It is a 100% fatal condition unless operated on immediately after birth. As you can imagine this made our hearts stop. The thought of our newborn going through something so horrific and possibly not making it through the first of three surgeries
Chas Kerlin Carnes, was born April 19, 2010 at 830pm. Weighing in at 8 pounds 9 ounces and 20 1/2 inches long. He was the most beautiful baby that I had ever seen. Eleven days after birth he under went his first surgery, April 30, 2010. Which he did very well with. After five weeks in the hospital we finally got to bring our baby home. He was home and doing well for about a week when we had a big scare. We had gotten him up for a bottle feeding and went to change his diaper when we noticed rthat it was full of blood. I turned to Chad and said, "Lets go to the ER now!" We went to the ER and they were surprised at the amount of blood that the baby was loosing. There concerns for a possible GI bleed. After a weekend of evaluation and extensive testring, it wound up being a milk prtien allergy. So we get our baby home yewt again. It's so nice to have him home and in his own environment. Yes, we have cardiac apointments every other week, physical therapy, occupational therapy, speech therapy, and multiple pediatric DR appointments, but we are home.
Two weeks later we go for a heart cath. Things are looking good but our Sano Shunt is getting a little kink in it where we are starting to grow up and become a big boy. So they decided that we needed to have our next open heart surgery. We weren'y expectring to hear that for at least two to three more months. Yeah, that was a really big supprise for us all. So July 13, 2010, we had the Glenn Procedure done. Chas, is doing well. He's having some issues with his stats like: his O2 is still staying in the 70's, his Heart Rate keeps going into the 200's, and his blood pressure systolic is staying in the low 100's. But with lots of prayers, love, and care, he's going to pull through this one as well.