Welcome.

This is the story of our daughter Emma. Her story begins with a rare birth defect called Gastroschisis. This space is dedicated to the days before her birth and the many that are sure to follow.

Overnight

Late.
Emma's PICC line failed, or so they thought. Her left arm developed a mass, so they thought that the line was leaking and irritating her skin. They pulled the line out only to discover that the line is not leaking. Now she's left with an unknown mass on her arm and no nutrition. They can't use her left arm due to the mass and they've been failing to place it in her right arm. They get it as far as her elbow, but no further. She is in serious danger of dehydration if they don't get it in by midnight.

I'm sitting in the lobby because they won't let me in to see her while they try and do this.

Later.
It's now Friday morning. Last night was horrible. Emma was in tremendous pain until they gave her a 2nd dose of morphine around 3am. She has two IVs in her head, a mass on her left arm, and her right arm is covered in bruises from failed PICC attempts. I came home around 3 and let Ashley know what was happening. She sat with her from 4am until around 630am. The latest news (It's now 9am) is that they've managed to run the PICC line into her leg. They'll keep her on the IVs until they know that the PICC is working. On the positive side, her bowel was reduced further and Dr. Rice has asked for another reduction.

I'm exhausted. I think I slept an hour. I'm at home with Ava and my best friend coffee.

1 comments:

kandi said...

that brought tears to my eyes. poor baby. did they explain why so many failed attempts? if it was just her body makeup then it is understandable, but if it was from inexperience i'd be stompin'some ass and making sure only veteran nurses are able to do any kind of proceedures on her!

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