Update #6

Update on Tobias

Yesterday and today have been full of a lot of tears. Yesterday around lunch time they went to suction out his ventilator tube and all of his stats started dropping. They had to take him off the ventilator and manually bring him back. After that they switched him to the oscillator ventilator. This type of ventilator opens up his lungs and keeps them open constantly. So instead of him inhaling and exhaling it’s one continuous motion. After that they ran a bunch of labs to rule out any possibility of an infection. They tried to get a urine sample and he just peed around the catheter so they decided to take that out. When they took it out they had to turn off the ventilator again and manually bring him back. They think that any little stimulation could easily set him over the edge. They are trying to not mess with him as much as possible. They also gave him blood, pain medication, and a medicine to medically paralyzed. The goal is to keep him as still and comfortable as possible to let him recover and to stop fighting the ventilator. Today when the doctors came around to do their rounds, we discussed where Tobias is at. The doctor really hopes she is wrong but she is afraid that he may not come back from this. This morning his heart rate was very low, he was up to needing 100% on his oxygen, and his co2 levels still weren’t the best. So they put him on medicine to raise his blood pressure so they could try to get his heart rate up. With his heart rate up he should be able to oxygenate his body better and hopefully get rid of the co2. They were able to get his heart rate up for a little while but not for more than an hour or two. Sadly the medication ended up raising his blood pressure too high. So they took him off of that and are trying a different one now. They also gave him another blood transfusion to help. During his chest x ray this morning his right upper part of his lung didn’t look the best. They have kept his right side up all day to help open him up on the right side. This afternoon when they went to do his chest x ray it thankfully looked better. Oddly enough even though he is medically paralyzed after his x ray he started to open his eyes and move. This little man is a fighter and was letting us know he’s not done fighting yet. Little man now has an iv in his arm and his foot, a picc line in his leg, and an arterial line in his arm (this keeps a constant look at his blood pressure and an easy access for lab work.) Please pray for him and his medical team. I swear Tobias’s favorite thing is to surprise the doctors, scare us, and being a toesy man (we call him this because he’s always sticking his big toe up like he is hitchhiking.)