Saturday, November 14, 2009

The Plan for Now

Friday, Andrea saw her pulmonologist again. We got the results of her sleep study and now have a plan moving forward. Unfortunately, Andrea's oxygen saturation levels dropped too much and too frequently over night for us to discontinue the oxygen use right now. At one point, she dropped 9 times in a hour. We originally thought we could discontinue the oxygen and just rely on the PulseOx, but it would alarm constantly. The doctor's thought is to keep Andrea on the oxygen until January, at which point he will schedule another sleep study. While we are disappointed to have to continue with the oxygen, we feel we put in too much time getting to this point to give up now. We prefer to be cautious.

Another change in Andrea's life was the addition of some maintenance medications for asthma. Andrea needed oral steroids twice in less than a month. It seems that, right now, she is susceptible to asthma when she gets a cold. Instead of relying on steroids when she gets sick, she's taking Flovent daily to keep her from having problems. When Kenny was young, the only way to medicate him was with a nebulizer. Things have changed so much in nine years that Andrea can take the same kind of medication as Kenny. We were given an inhaler for her, with a "spacer" and a tiny face mask. We hold the mask over her face for 30 seconds, and she inhaled the medicine. This is a HUGE improvement over 15 to 20 minutes for a breathing treatment. We were also given a rescue inhaler, so when she is wheezing, we can get her relief much faster. It is also easier to travel with the inhalers, instead of the nebulizer.

We go back to the pediatrician on Monday, to finally get Andrea her N1H1 (Swine Flu) vaccine. While we realize that no vaccine is 100% perfect, we'll feel better once she has some protection from swine flu. She's been tolerating her shots pretty well so far, and we hope that continues.

Andrea continues to teethe in earnest. So far, no teeth have appeared, but she is very drooly, and chews on anything she can get in her mouth. She has taken to pulling my fingers in. Smart baby that she is, she has learned that it hurts to chew on her own fingers, but it doesn't hurt to chew on mine! Most amazing of all, our 15 ounce baby is now 13 pounds, 11 ounces! She has fat little turkey legs and chubby cheeks. We never imagined this day would come!



“For today and its blessings, I owe the world an attitude of gratitude.”

1 comment:

  1. We're so happy to see Andrea grow so happily!!
    What a remarkable family!!
    XO
    C&R

    ReplyDelete