9 months!!

I can't believe that Fiona is 9 months old already!
I am already having anxiety about planning her birthday party, haha! We have SO many people on the list and I am having a hard time trying to find a big enough place that works with our budget!

Anyway... let's start with the good news! Fiona's first surgery is scheduled for September 22nd! YAY! We won't know what time until the day before, which sucks! We most likely will have to be there very early. I am thinking 7 or 8, which means leaving our house at 4 or 5 am! I have to call the Ronald McDonald House to see if there is any way we can be put on the list since we know we will be there at least 2 or 3 days. I'm not sure if they will do that or not. If not we have to wait until the day of her surgery to see if there is a room available. And if there isn't we will have to stay in a hotel. Tom has been working so much lately that he jokes that the few days off for Fiona's surgery will be a vacation for him, poor thing!

Ok, on to the bad news. Fiona is getting VERY good at scaring the S*** out of us. Last Monday night I had to call 911 again. Here is what happened: Our night nurse comes in at 11. I usually stay up for a bit and recap the day and bs for awhile. Around midnight I was sitting at the computer and the nurse had just finished feeding Fiona. She was asleep and the nurse was still holding her. All of a sudden she made this really weird noise. We both thought she was going to throw up so I jumped up to get a burp cloth and T (this is what I will call her from now on instead of the nurse!) put her down on her knee. She looked at her and yelled to me that her lips were blue. So I ran over and got the bag (like you see them using in medical shows, we use it all the time when we suction her) and turned the oxygen up as high as it would go. T put Fiona down in the nap nanny and by this time she was completely blue. I started bagging her and her oxygen level and heart rate just kept dropping. Within a minute she was now purple. Her eyes were rolled back in her head, she was foaming, and was completely unresponsive. I handed the bag to T and grabbed the phone and called 911. While I was calling I ran to the bedroom and screamed at Tom to get up and out to the living room. It is all kind of a blur now, but somehow while I was on the phone with 911 I managed to do an emergency trach change. Her oxygen and heart rate still weren't coming up. Her oxygen was at about 35% (supposed to be above 92%) and her heart rate was about 45 (supposed to be 130-140 while awake). T and Tom were trying to secure her trach ties, but she was in an awkward position and the trach slipped out. So I grabbed a new one and handed it to Tom who did another emergency change. As Tom and T were holding her up and bagging her I secured the ties. Her oxygen and heart rate finally started coming back up. Her levels were normal by the time the ambulance got there, but she had been blue for about 5 minutes and you could tell she was just out of it and so worn out. The decided to take her to the ER to be safe. We hate our ER (which is a whole other story in itself) but she needed to go. They did a chest x-ray and tested her for RSV. The Respiratory Therapist gave her an albuterol, which was dumb because she just had one before this whole incident. He didn't even know what flow to put the oxygen at to run it, so I had to tell him. It still wasn't running right and took like 1/2 an hour to finish. I then noticed we still had the HME on (at home her vent is connected to a humidifier, but when we are out we use these, also called an artificial nose or else she would dry out) and it had sucked up all the treatment. So he gave her another one. You are only supposed to give albuterol every 4 hours! Then he proceeded to suction her. I was on the phone and didn't see this, but Tom was furious. Before the RT started Tom told him that we suction down to 9 (there are numbers on the suction catheter). He said "OK" and then shoved the whole catheter down her trach. When he pulled it back up there was blood on the end of it. He was also using the wrong size catheter. He was using a 5/6 and we use an 8. He was a complete dumb ass. So after being there for 2 hours, the chest x-ray was normal and RSV test was negative so they sent us home. UGH, what a night. She got a good talking to and better not ever do that to us again. We actually are not exactly sure what happened, but our best guess is that her trach plugged. I am not entirely sure how I still have my sanity. But I would do anything for that little girl, including getting no sleep because I lay awake worrying about her! Just keep your fingers crossed that nothing like that ever happens again!