Saving Sam (Chapter 1.16): We wait and CC

If you wanted proof that I didn't blog last night, all you'd need to do is look at my text message inbox.  I received a bunch of "how's Sam doing?" inquiries, which I love.  But I also know if I would have shaken the cobwebs out of my head at around 9:00pm last night, I could have kept the suspense at a minimum.  That's not to say that things haven't been happening.  On the contrary, Sam's been a little fighter in the last day. 

When our story was last updated, Sam was sitting at 1 LPM of oxygen on a secondary machine.  The goal was for him to tolerate the 1 LPM so that we could move to the less invasive, more manageable wall unit.  To explain, the machine can really handle oxygen well when you're delivering a lot of oxygen (1 LPM or more...I think the highest I saw was 4.0 LPM when we we have been in the NICU. The wall unit specializes in CCs.  This much less oxygen, and it allows Sam to adjust in smaller increments (from 1.0 LPM to 0.8, 0.6, etc.).  

Sam moved to the wall unit just after our 2:00pm feeding.  By the 5:00pm feeding, he was already getting adjusted down to 0.8/0.6 and was holding his own.  We had two nurses (one in the middle of the night and one this morning) state that he probably could stay above 90% saturation without the oxygen but that they wanted to continue to keep his saturations up above 95% as he continues to make progress breathing on his own.  

But that's not the best part of today's update.  No, that belongs to the sheer fear that the Lioness has put into our fair Dr. Smith.  You see, I haven't interacted with Dr. Smith since she delivered good echocardiogram news like it was 4 steps back.  I must admit that when I would see her (as she was around the rest of the NICU), I wouldn't have a kind reaction.  But that was pre-Lioness.  Elisa had effectively put a little fear (and maybe some self-doubt in her delivery mechanisms) into the Dr. and I was very curious to see if it would continue.  We had asked the nurse for a status update of "where are we going now?" at our 8:00am feeding, and sure enough, once we brought down the dividers that we use for privacy, Dr. Smith came on over.  

If Elisa acted like a lioness, sneaking through the grass, in their one-on-one encounter, this one felt more like Elisa sitting on Pride Rock, keeping an eye on her prey to make sure that she behaved.  And trust me, Dr. Smith behaved.  She was like a completely different doctor.  She gushed over Sam.  Said he was adorable.  Said he was smiley.  She was truly impressed with how quickly Sam had come off of the oxygen to this point.  Dr. Smith now believes that they will be able to wean him off of the oxygen at St. Mark's.  Once he is off oxygen, we begin the 48-72 hour waiting period.  She also stated that if he stalls, in a couple days, we can still take him home on a small amount of oxygen.  Regardless, the path forward is clear.  We believe that sometime in the coming week, little Sam will be coming home.  

Little did we know that the gushing news would come from Dr. Smith.  Then again, when you're being watched by a lioness, you try to be a little more careful, nice, and friendly.  And you realize that a positive outlook might just have some holistic benefits as well.  

After all, while she talked about his progress, little Sam, laying on Elisa's chest, smiled.  Clearly, the cub realizes what kind of lioness his mother is.  

Brad