The Slow Road Home

What day is it? I have no clue. I'm starting to lose track of time here sitting by Natalie's bedside. It doesn't really matter, though, because at this point, Natalie has her own schedule of when she wants to return home. Whether it's five days, a week, or two weeks from now...it's all in her hands, or maybe more specifically, her lungs.

So sleepy, but looking more like herself every day

The past two days have been great for Natalie. She remains on the ventilator, but her doctors are slowly making changes to her ventilator settings to require her to to a bit more work. One of her doctors described this stage as "lifting weights." Her lungs were incredibly sick, and are on the rebound, but they need to start functioning like normal lungs again. They need to slowly start lifting the weight and getting stronger, until she can do it on her own. 

Each morning, she has an X-ray in her PICU room to examine her progress and to check on the position of her breathing tube. I've learned what to look for on these X-rays, as they pop up immediately on the computer screen. Before the doctor visits this morning and talks about it, I can guess that she still has a lot of issues with her lower left lobe. That area has some atelectasis, which is an area that has collapsed.

One of the new pieces of equipment recruited to help open up that area of her lungs is this machine:

Don't ask me what it's called, but it hooks up through the breathing tube and provides her albuterol (which helps to open the airways), along with some air pressure and a bit of oscillation (a shaking motion). The idea is to get the secretions in that area moving, so it can be suctioned out. Yesterday, the respiratory therapists had great success with it.

Of course, it's hard to determine when she'll be extubated. It all depends on how quickly her lungs can heal, and how quickly she can start doing all of this on her own. Her doctor hopes it can be Tuesday or Wednesday. Speaking of doctors, here is the cast of characters who have had a big role in either saving Natalie's life or aiding in her recovery.

Four doctors with four perspectives, but one goal: to send Natalie home.

Dr. Rogers was the first doctor we met, although Dr. Storm was here immediately after Natalie was flown here. Dr. Rogers spent the first few days with Natalie, and was the doctor who ended up intubating her on early Sunday morning (at about 3 a.m.). His positivity and reassurance was what we needed during that scary time.

Dr. Storm, it's safe to say, saved Natalie's life. On Monday morning, he switched her over to the high frequency ventilator. Later that night, when her lungs started failing again, he moved her to her stomach, a somewhat small change that started to change things in a big way for Natalie. That move immediately made a difference, then throughout the night, she started to slowly recover. He's not a man of many words, but his confidence is something we appreciated that night.

Dr. Gheen, also a man of few words, has been a huge part of Natalie's recovery. He was aggressive with her ventilator and helped her quickly return to the regular ventilator. He's a kind man, and he did a wonderful job of explaining her recovery plan to me.

Dr. Mosher arrived yesterday. Her innovative thinking is so welcomed here! She introduced the new chest PT machine, which has worked wonders so far. She's also very willing to sit and talk things out, and does it with a  smile!

Yesterday, we also had a couple of surprise visitors: Natalie's vision therapist from before she started preschool, Linda Kraft, and Calvin's preschool teacher, Jane Grunenwald (who brought with her a ton of delicious scotcharoos, which I'm counting as breakfast food today). It's so nice to see familiar faces here. We miss home so much, and that makes these surprises even more special. Thank you Linda and Jane!

One thing I expressed to them, and that I'm not sure I got across to all of you is exactly what happened on Monday night. A few of my brothers and their families, as well as Perry's parents and brother, traveled to Fargo that day because we were fearful it would be Natalie's last day here on Earth. My brother's priest joined us and prayed with us incessantly for God to heal Natalie. I spent most of the day lying in bed with her, reading scripture and messages from all of you.

Natalie's rosary was with her in the NICU, and now in the PICU

Something miraculous happened that day. Prayer chains were formed on Natalie's behalf. Children, friends, family and complete strangers began praying for our daughter. Over 32,000 people visited our family blog to see how Natalie was doing. The prayers were going up fast and furious.

And when I thought the end was near, one small move to her belly made all the difference. We started to have hope that maybe she could make a comeback. Slowly, though the night, she kept improving, until we realized that our miracle did happen. If only you could have witnessed what we witnessed...

Okay, I think I've rambled on enough for today. Thank you for keeping Natalie in your prayers. She still has a long road to recovery, and her tired little body needs all the help it can get.

Thank you from all of us...
Melissa