Sunday, August 8, 2010

Day 5 - 1

The medication they gave him for his abnormal heart rhythm worked. He now has a normal rhythm, which is a big relief!

They took an x-ray this morning to see if the fluid on his lungs/chest cavity drained with the new medication. It turns out his left side was clear! But his right side had as much or more fluid than it did yesterday. So they decided they needed to put a tube in there to drain it. Putting the tube in went fine. But they found that he had chyle, which is basically a fatty substance, accumulating in his chest cavity. Apparently this can happen from a vessel getting damaged during open heart surgery. This means that he cannot tolerate food with fat in it. Since breastmilk is so fatty, he cannot have any of my breastmilk that I've been pumping for him (and I can't nurse him) :( It was the one thing I felt that I could do to help him get better. He is currently on low-fat formula. We are hoping he heals up quickly and is able to tolerate fat again, but I guess this could also be a permanent condition.

He'll still be on the breathing tube and in the ICU for a while longer it seems.

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