update for today

Thank you for your faithful prayers and support. We are so thankful! Please keep up your prayers, because we know Jesus is hearing and answering each and every one.

Kellen is doing great. They are going to let him exclusively breast feed unless he is too tired to eat and then they will supplement. This really is amazing considering how closely they have kept up on how many mLs he is getting and how much weight he is gaining. I know Liz is really excited and it is another step in the right direction of getting to leave the hospital.

We still need to pray for Carson. He has been a lot slower to wean off the ventilator than they thought in the beginning. They believe some of the high pressures used in the beginning b/c of his swelling may have set him back and created some damage in Carson's lungs. In addition, he is getting more fluid in his lungs again and that makes it harder. They have had to go up on his ventilator settings today. He didn't have any sign of infection in his blood or urine, but some mild staph infection on his trach. They will continue his antibiotics and restart a diuretic to help him get rid of some more fluid. His G-tube insertion area has also not healed as much as they hoped. Dr. Yang believes Carson just might not have enough energy to heal all the various places on his body he has suffered trauma. As a result, the next few days, we are not going to make any ventilator changes and just let him rest. On a happier note, Liz and Preston are getting to hold Carson more and it just makes us all happy to see him looking so good. His color is so much better and he even is sucking on his pacifier. Both boys are so precious.

Liz and Preston are doing great. Recently, they were on a mission to get more premie clothing b/c Mr. Kellen likes to poop through all his diapers and managed to go through about 15 outfits in 2 days. Looks like Liz and Preston have lots of laundry in their future. :)

Please continue to pray for healing for Carson: no infections, healing for his lungs and ability to wean off the ventilator eventually, protection over him and patience for Liz and Preston as they wait for total healing for Carson.

twice the fun

Goodness...what a precious little boy.  Can you believe this little sweetie?!

We love you too, little one!

little fella

Blog Moderator, Ahdra, here and just had to comment on this picture Liz just sent of Carson.  Wow.  It looks like he already knows all the answers, right?

We sure love you little buddy!

update for today

Thank you to all of you for your prayers!!! YEAH, the ultrasound was negative for any masses or abnormalities on his liver. He has a gallstone, which they believe to be fairly normal and are just going to watch. Tomorrow he will get a CTScan of his lungs to make sure there aren't any potential areas of question for metastasis from his mass. They are not expecting any, but just to be thorough and make sure, they will get the study tomorrow.

Carson did have an elevated white blood cell count (indicating infection), so they got cultures from his tracheostomy, blood, and urine to see if they could find a source of infection. They started him on antibiotics prophylactically, and we will just wait to see what the results from his lab work are. Let's just pray he gets over this quickly and doesn't have any bad infections. His ventilator is the same.

Exciting news, it was okayed with surgery that he can have a pacifier so he gets to start having some practice sucking! It makes me feel better too because when he gets mad, we can at least try to soothe him with his pacifier. Starting a bad habit maybe, but oh well, he will grow out of it. :) He also got to wear his first stocking cap today!

Kellen is doing great. He gets to start breastfeeding twice a day instead of once. Liz and Preston are doing excellent. And both boys now weigh over 5 lbs!!!!!

Thank you to all your prayers and keep up the prayers for healing of Carson's neck and ability to swallow, for Carson to be able to get off the ventilator, and so Carson does not develop any serious infections. 

Have a wonderful Tuesday!

Posted by Sarah

update on special prayer request

Carson has had his ultrasound of his liver completed. However, we won't know any results until tomorrow. Thank you so much for your prayers and as soon as we know anything, we will email the information out. I will say, the doctors do not seem to be very concerned. The tech didn't really talk very much and wasn't sure when the doctors would review the results.

On a positive note, Carson got to go down on his ventilator rate to 30, which means he is doing more of the work himself. His bilirubin is also down to 4.8 instead of 10 where it was a week or so ago. His color is so much better than it was. He is doing great with his feeds and is up to 7 ml/ hour. He continues to pee and poop like a champ. :) They are hoping to start allowing him to suck on a pacifier soon, but need to get the okay from surgery that his surgical wounds are healed up. So, we will just keep praying for healing until we find out what the study showed.

Kellen is doing fantastic and is up to 45 mL per hour on his feeding! We are changing him to taking a bottle every other feed so he can get some rest in between bottle feeding. That way he can grow and get stronger faster to where he will be able to take a bottle with every feed. The doctors believe he will go home in the next 7 to 10 days.  Wow.

Prayers:
1) Continued healing for Carson's liver, ability to wean off the ventilator, protect his airway with swallowing, and be able to eat and swallow instead of having to use the G-tube.
2) Thanksgiving: his agitation level and ability to move his neck have been fantastic the last few days.
3) Direction for Liz and Preston with where to stay once Kellen is discharged from the hospital. The Ronald McDonald house has been wonderful but there are a lot of sick children there so it is not the best place to have a premature baby.

Thank you for all the prayers everyone!!!

Posted by Sarah

please pray

Carson's abdomen has been much more distended in the last few days. As a result, they took a chest x-ray this morning. The good news is that his bowel does not appear to be distended or have a lot of extra air in it. Unfortunately, it does show that his liver is quite a bit larger than it should be. They will be doing an ultrasound tomorrow looking for any abnormalities. There isn't any really good explanation for why it is so much bigger in the last few days. He is receiving nutrition via his veins and that is much harder on the liver, but it has been a pretty rapid increase in size. The doctors are somewhat concerned it may be issues with some of the malignant cells of his tumor spreading to his liver. This is the worse case scenario and hopefully not an issue, but we just were asking for prayers for wisdom for the doctors reading the ultrasound and healing of his liver. Hopefully, it is just from all the drugs and nutrition he is receiving and will go away on its own. The ultrasound is tomorrow around noon and then if necessary, they will schedule a CT Scan later but hopefully this won't be an issue.

On a positive note: Carson is up to 6 mL of breast milk every hour and pooping a lot better...go Carson! We all celebrated his first really good poop this morning. :) Because he is getting more food, his color has been a lot better too. He is also moving so much better in his neck than a week ago and we are so thankful for that. Also, your prayers have been appreciated so much for his comfort and God holding him while he was agitated as they took him off pain medication. He seems to be much calmer today and yesterday and we are hoping this is a trend it the right direction. :) He hasn't received any medications other than for his nutrition and to prevent reflux of his food since last Friday. Praise the Lord!

Kellen continues to do very well.

Posted by Sarah

update for today

Everything is about the same with the boys today. We took a break from the hospital to go to the state football game and it was AWESOME!!! Way to go Logan-Rogersville---state champs!!! We didn't get to dress up the boys in Wildcat garb, but someday we will. Although, Preston has made sure we understand they are going to be Bearcats.  :)

Kellen is cruising along and doing great. Carson had to go back up on his ventilator settings. He needed a little more help than we thought, but it may be all that turkey Liz ate, making him sleepy and wanting a day off. :) He is up to 5 mL of breastmilk every hour on his feeding so that is wonderful. He looks absolutely amazing and so much better than a week ago. We are so thankful.

Thank you so much for your prayers and we are just continuing to pray for healing for Carson's neck, ability to breathe on his own, swallow, and protect his airway. We hope you have a wonderful rest of your Thanksgiving weekend!

Posted by Sarah