Skimming the Tree Tops

There was so much that happened today I will never be able to regurgitate it all but I'll try. It started when Jessica called me while I was mowing the yard first thing this morning. She was crying and I couldn't understand what she was saying. Eventually I got that she was scared and the doctors kept referring to Rebecca as "a baby this sick". I knew it was time for me to get to Cincinnati. She soon called back and told me they were moving her to the cardiac ICU. There she will be able to be monitored better for her heart. From what I understand, the cardiologist that has been following her pretty much demanded she be moved. I quickly got cleaned up, packed my bags and left town. The 3 hour drive between Evansville and Cincinnati gives plenty of time for every possible scenario to run through my head. Every time I started to think negative I just stopped and said God you are not going to let this happen. I arrived to find Rebecca in her own huge procedure room. There was a stand with more IV pumps than you have ever seen. Her bed and body is a tangled mess of tubes and wires. They were trying to get some more access to her veins/arteries for everything she has to get. They started with her left arm and couldn't get anything. Then they tried her right thigh for femoral vein access but no luck. To our surprise they took her off of the oscillator and put her back on the conventional ventilator. They said it was mostly because the oscillator was making it difficult to get her lines in because of the movement it causes. She transitioned wonderfully back to the ventilator. They were giving several heart medicines to control her blood pressure. It's not just as simple as her BP though. Her vessels are "leaky" meaning the fluid is not staying in the vessels throughout her body it is leaking into her tissue making her very swollen. The complexity of the problem has to do with the amount of blood going to her lungs through the valve they are keeping open and the amount of blood going to the rest of her body. Basically her body is wanting to send too much blood to the lungs and not enough to the body. So they are trying to correct with several medicines. They feel this is all being caused by an infection or sepsis although they have not pinpointed it. The plan is to keep her stabilized with medicine until the antibiotics can wipe out the infection. They had doctor rounds at 5:00 here and that is when we met the overnight attending Doctor. He is amazing. He can be completely in the cardiac zone one minute, be personal and tell us what's going on the next, ask a nurse how she is doing, back to the cardiac zone and then talk baseball with me. They completely know how to handle her situation. Right after rounds all of the doctors and RTs and a couple of nurses came back to Rebecca's room. Their plan was to change her ET tube to one with an inflatable cuff because she was leaking and it wasn't ventilating her adequately. Then they were going to try her left thigh for femoral vein access and at the same time get another line in somewhere for arterial access. They tried her foot first with no luck. They ended up having to do a "cut down" which means making an incision in her wrist to see the artery then put a line in it. This line allows them to monitor her blood pressure in real time so they can make medicine adjustments on the fly as needed. They still didn't have a vein accessed but she was actually kind of stable. About 7:00 he told us she is very very sick and could die. He said she was just "skimming the tree tops". We suspected this, but to hear a doctor say it verified it. Although we don't put our trust in doctors telling us our girls aren't going to make it, we were very happy with his complete honesty. He then said he thought she was going to be ok. A couple of hours later he said we are now trending in the right direction. They decided about 9:00 to go for her vein in her neck. They knew they were going to need it to give her fluids through the night. It went in pretty easily. So just to summarize, she has a PICC in each arm, a venous line in her neck and a arterial line in her right wrist and that's just the IV's. She has a catheder in down below, ET tube, NJ feeding tube in nose, oxygen monitors on her forehead and back, heart monitors, temp probe and O2 sat sensor. Tonight she has 2 nurses assigned solely to her and has had most of the attention the whole night. It is now 11:00 and they have her settled in and stable. I did finally get Jessica to leave and go see Joanna around 8:15 for a couple of hours. I knew it would be good for her to experience something positive for a change. They moved her feeding tube to her nose so she can see what it's like to have nothing in her mouth for once. This hopefully one step closer to feeding normally. 

Thank you everyone for the prayers the last few days. Jessica had to bear most of the burden here alone and she appreciates it. Thank you also to the wonderful co-workers at Methodist Hospital for dedicating a time to collectively pray for Rebecca. Also, I don't know how, but my shift at work tomorrow is being taken care of so I can stay here - thanks!


I know these pictures of Rebecca aren't the most pleasant but it gives an idea of what's going on. Joanna is loving life on her new cannula.