Gavin is still in the PICU. Children’s Hospital in SD is indeed different from the one in DC; I feel that they are more stricter here especially with visitation, but nonetheless, the medical staff is great. Gavin was extubated yesterday night in the OR and everything went well. Shortly after extubation, the ENT doctor also scoped Gavin to look at his upper airway which he said looks great with no inflammation, but a few secretions. He is no longer on any sedation meds via IV, but continues to get methadone and Ativan via gtube to help with withdrawals. His heart rate and O2 stats are also very good considering that he is completely breathing on his own now. Gavin still needs to see the pulmonologist at Children’s to fully determine if he needs the BiPaP device before he is discharged. We are hoping to take him home by Monday. Audrey Bella finally came back home with my parents from Las Vegas this morning and it was sooooooo nice to see our girl again- we missed her soooo much and she was so excited to see us again. Boy is she really talkative and inquisitive-we really missed her so much. We feel bad because we also left her with my parents in the summer of 2009 for 2 months when we took Gavin to the Philippines and Guam on a miracle mission trip 3 months after we found out about his diagnosis, but Audrey was only 7 months old then and even today, it didn’t seem like she was mad at us for leaving :p Ferd and I just can’t wait to go back to our regular routine and also for the 4 of us to be cuddling at home listening to Audrey sing and dance, holding Gavin in our arms with suction machine on stand-by, and watching movies as a family- a typical weekend for us (which may seem boring for some) but it sure is one of our favorite and priceless moments. Thank you for checking in. More updates to come.
