The Thorne Family Escapades: August 17, 2012

The above pictures were taken yesterday post-op. On before extubation, one after extubation.

Short Version: Hard night last night. Medically speaking-Nolan is doing awesome-though he personally would disagree. Off oxygen, Foley tube & the arterial line today.

Descriptive Version:

We had a challenging first night. I think Scott and I maybe got a total of one hour sleep-and broken sleep at that. Our plan of tag-teaming with one going to the trailer for awhile & the other staying with Nolan backfired when Nolan requested we BOTH stay. And I'm sorry, we are both softies when it comes to him right now and there was no way we'd not let him have his way after the ordeal he went through. So we BOTH stayed. The staff didn't mind that we were there-they just were not set up to accommodate us in the room last night because typically the first night-the parents don't stay. So we volleyed between sitting in plastic folding chairs to standing by Nolan's bed.

Nolan had a difficult night. The pain meds would wear off and he'd wake up in pain. At which point he would usually say to us "I can't breathe" and he'd struggle with his tubes etc. We would try to calm him down while his night nurse would give him some more pain meds. He had one nurse assigned to him only all night long. Nolan would basically follow this pattern every hour to hour and a half. Then it would obviously take some time to calm him down and put him to sleep. Not much different than an infant up all night needing food, only his food was pain meds. On a positive note-at different times during the night when he would ask me for things he would say thank you, and please-which kind of impressed me. (Though they were few and far between-but hey-grabbing for straws here).

In the morning, they removed his nasal canula (took him off oxygen). They also removed his Foley catheter (the pee tube), and the arterial line in his left arm was just taken out. Nolan has been cranky, sleepy and uncomfortable most of the day today-no wonder the hospital staff said no visitors. We could be in for another long night. He just asked me "When do we go to the trailer?" When I told him not for a few days, he was very upset, attempted to take a swing at me and started crying. Not much different than mom and dad-except we held our crankiness at bay and so far haven't taken swings at each other :) Seriously-I'm amazed how well Scott and I are functioning today and with our patience level.