A Very Long Week

We've had many more ups and downs...although this week it seems as though our boys have had many many downs...both Stephen and I feel that we're due for some positive things the next few days. I don't even know where to start other than both our boys are very very sick.

Andrew took quite a dive on Sunday and we weren't sure if he'd make it through the night. They had to put him back on the oscillating ventilator, more so because his little body is fighting so hard with infections that they don't want to over strain his lungs and they needed to regulate a lot of things with his blood work levels. We also found out that on top of the yeast, staph and Aspergillus infections, he now has pneumonia. So Sunday when we got a phone call from the hospital, we rushed up to be right by his side. We ended up spending the night at the hospital and we were very emotionally drained by Monday afternoon. He's still with us and has been stable for a couple days, but he is definitely a very sick little boy. Then on Tuesday, after more tests it looked like he was at high risk for hydrocephalus (water on the brain) and may possibly need surgery to relieve the pressure. Because of this his infections and this other high risk, they decided to transport him up to Primary Children's hospital so he could be closely monitored by the doctors and surgical team up there. This was the second time in the last few weeks that our doctors thought he was going to pass away, but once again he turned a corner, and is stable, albeit worse than before the setback. One other bit of good news which is a pretty big deal is that the aspergillus infection has not spread to other parts of his body that we can see. This fungal infection is so voracious that it can get all over the place within a day or two, but Andrew's little wounds have been healing. It will be over a month before we'll know if it has been beaten back or not, since it can pop up anywhere at any time, but his first week and a half with it he has definitely been keeping it at bay, and even winning some battles. He sure is fighting hard. There are so many things going wrong with him that we cherish these victories, even if the victory is only a lack of bad news :).

Ethan was doing so great, but just a few days ago has also started to become sicker. They first saw that his white blood cell count was really high (knowing that his body was trying to fight some sort of infections) so they stopped his feedings (out of fear of necrotizing enterocolitis, NEC) and have done numerous tests to figure out where and what is infected...so far nothing has come back positive. which is good news, but with all the cultures they are doing, we must wait at least a week or more to make sure. So as for now, we really don't know what or where he is infected, but his body is telling us that he is. He also is  showing signs for the hydrocephalus, so they were able to transport him up to Primary Children's as well. I'm glad that both our boys are at the same hospital to make it easier on us and I know that Primary's has amazing doctors. They really couldn't be in a better place right now and we are so grateful for a the wonderful care they are receiving.