Ear tubes inserted. Finally.

Grace had her ear tube surgery this morning.

 We got up bright and early and went to the doctor's office.  Grace got to wear her pajamas!

 Then she put on a gown and hat.

 And looked so adorable and tiny.

I put a hat on, too trying to cheer Grace up.  But Grace took hers off saying, "I don't want to play doctor."  I think she was nervous.  I know I was.

Next, we went to the pre-op room.  The anesthesiologist came in and asked us some general medical history questions and a then nurse took Grace's picture with a polaroid camera.  That was pretty neat.  And before we knew it, three nurses came in and took Grace away. 

Within minutes, it was all over.  David and I were in Grace's recovery room before she even woke up.  She looked like a sleeping angel.  A few moments later, Grace was awake and ready to go home. 

After we got home, we realized Grace still had her thermometer on.  And her wrist bracelet.  I saved both for her baby book.  I was astonished to see how quickly Grace recovered.  She acted like nothing had even happened.  In fact, Grace acted like she felt better than she had in weeks.  I am simply amazed by children's resilience.  And I am so thankful that everything went well and my baby is feeling better.

Ear tubes for sure.

We saw the ENT this morning.  And he confirmed that both of Grace's ears are now infected.  We talked about her falls and he said that it's pretty rare for an ear infection to cause balance issues like Grace has, but he thinks that Grace falls into that category.  It's also rare for an ear infection to cause a fever as high as hers, but it's not impossible.  So we are going to start Grace on amoxicillian today to prevent an abscess forming above her tooth.  Then a week from tomorrow, Wednesday 23, Grace is getting ear tubes first thing in the morning.  Please keep Grace (and us) in your prayers.

Maybe no ear tubes after all...

Today we took Grace back to the Ear, Nose, and Throat specialist.

David was able to go with us which made Grace feel much more comfortable.  She loves her daddy!

They tested her hearing and while there was some negative pressure, her hearing is fine.  They tested her ears by sending a sound in and then waited to see if her ear returned a sound.  Isn't that interesting?

After that we met with the specialist and he examined her ears and throat.  And the great news is that while there is fluid behind both ears, the fluid is bubbly which means that air is getting back there and the fluid is starting to drain.  In other words, this third round of antibiotics is working!  He wants to see Grace again in 4 weeks to see how her ears are doing.  If the fluid is gone by then and she doesn't get another ear infection in the next few months then she won't need ear tubes!  The specialist specifically said if we can make it to Grace's third birthday, then she most likely will not need the tubes.  Fingers crossed we can make it that long.

After meeting with the Ear, Nose, and Throat specialist and discussing our visit, David and I have decided to leave Grace out of school until January or so.

Ear tubes?

Last night Grace threw up.  She yelled for some help and ran to the bathroom and threw up in the bathtub.  Poor thing.  Even when she doesn't feel well, she can be so sweet and considerate.  She threw up in the bathtub so she wouldn't make a mess!  She just melts my heart!

Then this morning Grace woke up with a slight fever so I called a new pediatrician we were referred to and they worked her in for an appointment.  I got Grace dressed and we headed to Fairhope.  The doctor looked in Grace's ears and said that it looked like all the fluid from her last ear infection never drained completely.  There was fluid behind both ears and the left one was a little red.  This was Grace's third ear infection in 6 months so the pediatrician decided to refer us to an Ear, Nose and Throat specialist because with 3 or more ear infections in that  time frame, Grace is a good candidate for ear tubes.  That's so scary to me and David!  

In the meantime, the doctor gave Grace two shots of antibiotics to go ahead and clear up the fluid and redness in her ears.  Grace's last ear infection was 5-6 weeks ago right before we went to Charlotte for David's surgery.  That means that Grace could have had fluid behind her ears for the whole time!  Poor baby.

So Grace has an appointment with the ENT on Monday afternoon.  David and I discussed it and we have decided to leave Grace out of school for the next 6 months or so.  Grace never had ear infection problems before we put her in school because she never really got sick.  And I remembered her Omaha pediatrician telling us that Grace would be prone to ear infections whenever she got a cold because of the way her ear canal is shaped.  He also told us that it would just be temporary and by the time she was 3 1/2 to 4  her ears would have developed enough that Grace would have grown out of being subject to infections whenever she got sick.

So I'm going to take Grace to the ENT on Monday afternoon, but we're going to hold off on putting Grace back in school for at least the next six months with the hopes that she won't get another ear infection in that time frame and we can avoid putting tubes in her ears. 

There's no place like home

After two days driving in the car, we are finally home!  We made it safe and sound and arrived very tired.  It was a hard drive for us all.  David was still feeling very sore and gets tired quickly.  Climbing in and out of the minivan was really tough on him.  I tried my best to drive "softly" meaning starting and stopping slowly and avoiding as many bumps as possible to keep from jostling his organs, but that's really hard to do in Atlanta traffic and on Alabama roads.  And Grace got car sick and threw up less than an hour into the trip.  Chloe was, well, Chloe.  She didn't like being left in the car while we went inside restaurants to eat, but was really well behaved.  None of us really had much of an appetite.  After arriving home, I unloaded the minivan and rested for about an hour before heading to the grocery store.  Now that we're here and comfortable, we plan to rest and recover.  There's no better place to do that than at our home sweet home.

Post surgery: We're out of the hospital!

David was doing so well Sunday that I decided to finally go back to his parents house for the first time to get some real sleep for a change. When I arrived back at the hospital Monday morning, I found out that both David and Bud were being discharged from the hospital. What a wonderful answer to all of our prayers!

David is doing much better. He received two 12 hour IV antibiotics on Sunday to clear up a little redness and puffiness around one of his incisions. He has a prescription for a 5 day antibiotic and about 2 weeks prescription pain killers. His pain while taking these pills has been holding steady around a 4 - much better than what it was previously. He has a post surgery follow up visit with his surgeon Thursday at noon. Assuming it goes well, we will have the okay to head home this weekend.

Bud is also at home now. He is on various medications. His pain level has increased over the past few days, but we are told that was to be expected. Immediately after surgery, he was on strong medication and steriods to prevent him from initially rejecting the kidney and now that medication is wearing off. Hopefully, the pain will decrease again soon.

Thank you all for your prayers and concern over the last few days and weeks. We are so thankful to have had so many people praying over us during this worrisome time in our lives. We are blessed that both surgeries went so well. Both David and Bud's surgeons said that the surgeries couldn't have gone better. The kidney was perfect and both David and his dad are recovering very well. I am convinced that God heard each prayer on their behalf and He watched over both of them all the way through surgery and continues to watch over them as they heal. God truly has blessed us and we are so thankful for His blessings and for each of you.

Post surgery: Day 2

Today Bud is doing much better.  He is able to eat regular meals now and is up roaming the halls. His energy levels are incredible and he looks like a new man.  What a blessing to see such a dramatic change in him! 

David, however, is still on a liquids only diet and has a hard time moving around due to his pain levels.  He really misses his coffee!  We also had a conflict with one of our nurses that caused David to have a pain setback. 

David had a nurse whom I'll call "Joan" and she kept telling David to use breathing and visualization techniques to deal with his pain instead of giving him medication.  She kept saying that David just had major surgery and he was going to have pain and he just needed to work through it.  What a quack!  She thought David should imagine being on the beach with Grace and his pain would just dissapate.  Maybe it would if he was dunking Nurse Joan under the water...  Anyway, when your pain level is a 10 it's a little hard to imagine it away.  Crazy Joan actually told us a story of an 8-9 year old girl that she help reset a broken bone without any medication!  Needless to say, we went to the head of the transplant center and had nurses swapped.  Our new nurse whom I'll call "Angie" talked to David's surgeon and now David is on dilaudid instead of morphine and it is working much, much better.  His pain level has decreased to about a 6 which David says he can tolerate.  He has a high pain threshhold!

Anyway, now that Nurse Joan is off helping someone other than David things are going much, much better for us.  Nurse Angie is very attentive to David and doesn't believe in unnecessary pain - a woman after my own heart!  David is resting as much as he is able between blood pressure checks, temperature checks, etc., and his pain is somewhat tolerable.  I plan to stay here at the hospital again tonight to help David as much as I am able. 

Thank you again for keeping us in your prayers.  I truly believe that the worst is finally behind us and better days are just over the horizon.  God is watching over all us as David and Bud begin to heal and I have faith that we will all be going home soon.

Post surgery: Day 1

Thank you to everyone for your continued support and prayers. We are overwhelmed by all the emails and phone calls we've received from so many people just expressing their love and concern for us. Thank you for your thoughts and kind consideration. It may take me a while, but I plan to answer each email and return every voicemail - just please be patient. :)

Today Bud has been doing extremely well. He is now out of ICU and has been moved to his own private room just down the hallway from David. His vitals are great and his skin color is wonderful. He is even up walking around all by himself and is hardly using any pain medication at all. Not too long ago he surprised David and me by showing up in our room. David was so glad to see him doing so well. It was the first time they have seen each other since the surgery. They compared surgery scars, of course. :) The doctors have Bud on a regular diet and Bud is joking around with everyone he meets. He's walking so much, he's becoming hard to keep up with! His recovery has truly been amazing and we are so thankful he is doing better than we expected in such a short time.

David is also doing better. The nurses took his first labs today and they came back good. After a few bumps this morning, we finally seem to have his pain under control. While he is not pain free, the pain levels are tolerable. He still gets nauseated from time to time and cannot eat anything yet, but we are working on that. He can drink water and juice. We hope he will be able to eat sometime tomorrow afternoon. Today we walked up and down the hallway twice and then David sat in a chair by the bed for almost 40 minutes this afternoon. Currently, he is getting some much needed rest. His surgeon and nurses have told him that today would most likely be the toughest day for him and I am hoping that the worst is behind us now. 

Surgery update

David is in his private room and he's doing a lot better now.  They've changed out his medication and that seems to have really helped.  He's sleeping now.  Bud is doing very well - in fact, he's already cracking jokes. 

Update

I was just able to see David. He is in a lot of pain now and could really use your prayers. His vitals look good but they won't move him out of ICU until his pain is under control. He's on morphine now but his pain level is still at an 8 on a scale of 1 - 10. Please keep praying for us. It's so hard to see him hurting so much and be unable to do anything to help.

Transplant Surgery Update

Bud is now out of surgery. He also finished early - almost 1 1/2 hours early to be exact! We just finished speaking with his surgeon. Bud did very well especially for someone his age. His arteries were flexible and pliant making it very easy to join his new kidney to his old ones. The Dr specifically said that David's kidney was "beautiful" and "it couldn't have gone better." And "as for a kidney transplant, you couldn't have a better or more perfect procedure." We are so blessed that everything has gone as well as it has.

In addition, neither David nor Bud even needed a blood transfusion. That is incredible!

We are so thankful for everyone keeping us in your thoughts and prayers. It means so much to us to have so many people praying for us and supporting us during this time. God has been so gracious to us!  Please continue to pray for a speedy recovery!

Transplant Surgery

I just wanted to post a quick update on David and his dad, Bud.  David, Bud, Helen, and I arrived at the hospital around 5:15 (Eastern Time) this morning.  Then a nurse took David and his father back to the pre-op room to prep for their surgeries.  Then Helen, Jennifer (David's sister), and I were able to go back and visit with David and Bud for a while.  During that time we met with the surgical staff and really feel confident in them.

Then at 7:25 (again, Eastern Time) David was wheeled back to the operating room.  Watching him go was much harder than I expected, but I have peace since I know that David is in God's hands.  I've done alot of praying for David and Bud - especially in the last few days.  And I know that there are many other people who love them both and are praying for them as well. 

We stayed with David's dad for another hour until they wheeled him back at 8:25.  After that we headed back to the family waiting room and was told that David's surgery began at 8:11 and we were just informed that Bud's surgery started at 9:11. 

At 10:02 we were informed that the kidney was out of David and on its way into Bud. A few minutes later, we spoke to David's surgeon and he told us that David came through the surgery very well and that they were waking him up. He'll be in his recovery room for a while and then they'll move him to a private room around 12:30 (Eastern Time) and we'll be able to visit with him then.

Both surgeries are going faster than expected which we are taking as a good sign. David was finished almost an hour early.  His surgeon, Dr Kercher also took pictures for us.  He must have known how much I love pictures!   I'll upload them when I have a chance.  In the meantime, Bud is still in surgery but we should hear more soon.
Thank you all for your continuing prayers and concern. God has heard each one of them and I know that He is looking over both David and Bud today. We are so thankful that everything is going as well as it is and we are continuing to pray for both David and Bud to recovery as quickly and painlessly as possible.

Nesting

It's official.  I've started that "nesting" stage of pregnancy.  Quite a bit early actually, but I have a feeling it's here to stay so I'm making the most of it.  That explains why I haven't been posting as often as usual.  But my house is clean and smells great!  Laundry is caught up.  The floors are spotless.  I've steam cleaned our carpets.  Twice.  Even dusted the baseboards.  But most importantly, I've got the nursery ready. 

David is so smart and understanding.  He knew I really wanted to get our desk out of what was previously our office and move it upstairs to our bedroom.  So what did he do?  He didn't argue with me, just made me promise not to overdo it, and then helped me carry it up the stairs.  What a wonderful husband.  He knows my hormones are completely out of wack and I make no sense now so he just rolls with it.  Everyday I fall more in love with him.

So the desk is now in our bedroom and I've got the crib put together complete with Grace's old bedding.  I love it.  I also took the bookshelf that was at the entrance to the room and moved it by the window.  Then I took all the books off and put those in the top of the closet so I can use the bookshelf for baby stuff.  Stuff like onesies and diapers and burp cloths.  And I've moved the glider into Little Indy's new room.  It looks great. 

And since we now have a desk with computer in our bedroom I had to move my dresser to make room for it.  So I went through everything in my closet and decided to toss quite a bit.  Mostly with clothes that I never wear for various reasons.  Reasons like blouses too tight in my chest or blouses too short because of my ever expanding chest.  Shoes that don't fit because my feet have grown again.  25 pairs of shoes I'm parting with.  Wow.  But now that my closet is nearly empty, I was able to move my dresser into the closet freeing up floorspace for the desk.  I have to admit I really like the new floorplan.  Plus David was able to hook our computer up to our nice big flat panel TV.  Now we can watch our instant Netflix movies on our TV.  I'm really loving that.  Did I mention how wonderful and understanding my husband is?  He is the best.

Now the house is ready for Baby and we are ready for our trip to Charlotte.  David's upcoming surgery is the real reason I started nesting early.  He won't be able to pick anything more than 5 pounds for 6 weeks following his surgery, so we needed to get as much done prior to the surgery as we could.  I'm so happy that we finished everything on our list.  So now we are getting ready to drive up to Charlotte.  David's surgery is scheduled for Thursday May 6.  Please keep us in your prayers this week. 

There's a bug going around

The guys weekend ended Saturday, so Grace and I came home after we all ate dinner at Olive Garden.  Grace has had a runny nose for a couple of days now.  We assumed it was allergies since David's allergies have been bothering him.  This morning, however, she woke up with a bad cough and said her tummy hurt, so we decided to take her to the walk-in clinic.  In addition, David felt like his allergies had turned into a sinus infection and was moving into his chest, so he decided to go to the clinic as well.

Apparently, there are a lot of sick people right now.  We waited at the clinic for over 2 hours before seeing a doctor.  It turns out Grace has an ear infection along with her cough, so she is now on antibiotics and a prescription strength decongestant.

The doctor listened to David breathe and then ordered a chest x-ray for him.  Turns out, he has a small case of pneumonia.  It's a good thing we had him checked out!  Hopefully, with both David and Grace on antibiotics, they'll get better soon.  In the meantime, we plan to stay close to home and drink plenty of fluids and get lots of rest.  Keep us in your prayers!

Update on Luke

The surgeons opened and cleaned Luke's incision.  There was a stitch that was infected so the doctors removed it and used nylon stitches to close the new incision.  Luke was able to go home yesterday evening, but will have to go back to Charleston in 12 days to remove his new stitches.  We are so thankful that everything went well and Luke is back at home with his family.  Thank you for your prayers.

Please pray for baby Luke and his family

Luke's incision from his heart surgery has once again become infected.  It was tested and came back positive for Mercer (also known as MRSA), a very serious type of staph infection that is sometimes called a "superbug" because of its resistance to most antibiotics.  

Bethany and Ed are in Charleston today to meet with the surgeon and have Luke's incision opened and cleaned.  Luke will be admitted to the hospital (hopefully for just a couple of days) and put to sleep and given intravenous antibiotics.  Please pray for Luke and his family.  We hope that this procedure works and gets rid of Luke's infection for good.

To read more about Luke and his journey, please click here.

Luke is out of surgery and he did great!

Thank you, everyone, for keeping Luke Donaldson in your prayers.  He is now out of surgery and the doctors say he did great.  He had to have a blood transfusion - which is normal considering he had open heart surgery.  His blood pressure is a little low, but the doctors are keeping a close eye on it.  The surgery lasted most of the day - about 9 hours.  His family is finally able to see him.  We are so thankful that he came through so well and will continue to pray for a speedy recovery for him.  The next three days are the most critical according to the doctors, but I have faith that he is going to recovery quickly and will be able to go home with his family soon.

Luke's surgery is almost over!

I just received an update from Luke's daddy, Ed and Luke's grandmother, Mammee (pronounced Ma-mee).  They are over half-way through with Luke's surgery.  Everything is going well.  The doctors are getting ready to take Luke off the bypass machine and then they will need to restart his heart.  That just sounds so frightening to me.  Hopefully Luke will be in recovery within 1-2 hours.  Please keep praying!

Luke is in surgery

Luke was taken back to begin his surgery this morning around 6:00 am.  We are expecting the surgery to last most of the day.  Please pray for Luke and his family and his doctors and nurses.  Please pray that God will provide the surgeons the wisdom and the skill needed to perform this surgery.  Please pray that God will bring peace and comfort to his family as they wait over the next several hours.  And most of all, please pray that God will be with baby Luke during his surgery.  That Luke's heart will be healed completely and he will be able to go home with his family very, very soon.

I have faith that this will happen and I am praying with the encouragement of the Lord who says,  ^"If you believe, you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer."  Matthew 21:22


Thank you for you prayers and support as Luke continues to fight for life.  I will keep you updated as I hear more.

Update on Luke James Donaldson

It has been a very worrisome few days.  Wednesday evening Luke had a balloon put in his heart and later began running a fever.  And then a lung collapsed.  He was put on a ventilator and now has a drip and two tubes in his throat.  He seems to be doing better but I believe the doctor's are going to postpone his surgery.  Due to the risk of flu, only Bethany and Ed are able to see him.  Little Luke has already been through so much and hasn't even had his surgery yet.  Please continue to keep him in your prayers.  Please pray for his heart, and the rest of his body, that he will be healed entirely.  And please pray for his family as well.

Ed was on his way back to Charlotte to care of a few things and hit a wheel barrow on the interstate!  Thankfully, he was not injured, but we can't say the same thing for his car.

Please remember to keep the Donaldsons in your prayers.  The Lord hears them all and we will continue to trust in Him.