Recovery Day 1 - Making Progress

Yum, yum, my first solid!

Update 3: Blake is recovering like a champ. In fact, a few of the nurses have mentioned that he is the most stable kid on the floor.  No small feat for just having undergone open-heart surgery. After getting "gorgeous" chest x-rays back we were able to give him some Pedialyte through a bottle; he sucked it down.  He tolerated that very well so then we were able to give him some milk through a bottle; he sucked it down too.  But, they will only give him 1.5 oz. at a time now to see how he tolerates it, and for a guy that normally drinks 4.5 oz. per feeding, that little bit just ticked him off!  So, we had a first inside of TCH; we fed him his first solid of rice cereal.  He dug it.  It filled him up and sent him happily into a deep food sleep.  Now he really is going to be a chunky monkey!

Handsome boy with no breathing tube

Update 2: Extubation (removing his breathing tube) was a success!  He is now breathing on his own like a champ.  He just had his blood gasses tested to see how well he was oxygenating his blood now, and they said they are better now than they were on the ventilator (just another sign he likes to prove people wrong).  Next, they will take a chest x-ray to ensure there are no fluids on the lungs, and if that looks good we will try to feed him a bottle this afternoon.

Update 1: Blake is doing great! He had a very comfortable and stable night. This morning after we came in he immediately woke up after hearing our voices. He is on scheduled morphine so that he doesn't feel any pain. The doctors just rounded and the plan for the day is to get Blake off of the ventilator and reduce his meds for his heart (right now he is down to two from three last night). He has very little blood draining from his incisions, and overall the doctors say he is doing really well.

Today is exactly four months from his first surgery. What a little hero.