Happy 11-week Birthday!

It has been a cold, rainy, blustery day here in west L.A. so there hasn’t been much motivation to leave Rudy’s warm room.  Rudy’s assignment was to rest, rest, rest today in order to recover from yesterday’s procedure and in preparation for tomorrow’s surgery …he started battling a high heart rate off and on last night and that continued all day today accompanied by red-faced tantrums and general discomfort so he has kept nurse Amy on her toes by setting off his monitor alarm practically every time she sat down to do her charting.  Hopefully he’ll be able to sleep well tonight (I know nurse Amy will!).  He’s number two in the OR tomorrow so he’ll be transported downstairs late morning/early afternoon.  It seems to me that it is taking him longer and longer to recover from his “procedures” so I’m praying tomorrow’s pleurodesis will do the trick for many reasons.  Dr. Brian will enter Rudy’s side, irritate or “rough up” the lung and chest cavity lining creating scar tissue so they will fuse together and seal off the pleural cavity.  It could take the fluid up to 4 days to stop draining so we’ll have some more waiting to do over the weekend.  While he’s in there, Dr. Brian will do some other things to, hopefully, increase our odds of success.  The team stopped Rudy’s feeds the night before last and although it seemed his stomach was softer and ready for formula again today they decided not to start the feeds back up again until after tomorrow’s surgery…maybe the extra rest for his stomach will do him some good and make the next attempt at feeding stick!!

Happy 11-week birthday Rudy!  You’re a pro-fighter, little man…you deserve a trip to Disneyland!!