Peace while we wait and trust...

I mostly have a lot of peace while we wait and trust. The doctors are all hopeful now, which helps. Allen still runs a temp and they still put him on those cooling blankets which make him shiver. I hate that, but I hated putting baby Jamie in a cold bath when she was tiny and running a fever, too. It was hard leaving him last night because of it. But today, though he's still at 99.3, he's not on the cooling blanket. The doctors are still doing cultures to make absolutely sure of no infection before they do a shunt for the 'brain drain', hopefully on Friday.

When Jamie and I got here this morning, the doctors have been pleased with his CPAP all day and vent at night, so this morning they took him off CPAP and he's on just oxygen on his trach... all on his own now, 'cept for the extra O2. So far so good. They are drawing the blood now to check for CO2 levels. I'm praying he is breathing well enough for that. The sooner he's off of it the sooner the trach can come out. He mouths things to me a lot and sometimes I can read his lips and sometimes I can't. It's frustrating, but I'm just glad he's trying.

He's laying near me and looking around, then gets tired and rests. We opened up the blinds on the recommendation of this great lady, Stacie, who is with pallative care. Patients get disoriented with days and nights and it should help when he sees the outdoors light, I hope. While I was checking email and facebook, Jamie was reading one of Allen's Sci-Fi books to him. He loves re-reading books. He really gets his money out of a book. We tease him about being an archivist because you can hardly tell they've been used. He barely opens them so as not to break the spine and never, never, never folds back the pages or folds corners or anything. Me... I fold pages, lay them on their faces open... hey, it's my book! Now, I don't do that to anyone else's book, so no worries if you lend them to me. I know how to be an archivist! LOL

The people here at St. Luke's, nearly all of them, have been incredible. Some nurses are more friendly and positive than others, but I haven't met one who didn't give their all taking care of him.

Allen's mom and brothers had to leave yesterday. It was SO hard on her. She cried and cried that she didn't want to leave him like this. I told her that he is SO much better now. We still hope and pray he'll be home in a week or so.

Thank you so much for your prayers and messages and everything you are doing for us. I hurt for Tammy Jo and Mark and keep them in prayers, as well. We want God to take care of the clots well and quickly. Also, my brother is home and doing well after the triple bypass.

So... now it's Jamie, Erin, Christy, Peter, Betsy and I this week. Jamie and I are able to stay up her the most. Erin comes often and then helps with Betsy a lot, too. Christy comes all she can and Peter keeps us going to and from and tries to keep us distracted with other things so we don't get worn out with just sitting at the hospital. My hard time is this is the only place I want to be.

Keep praying as we trust and wait. Know that God keeps hearing your prayers and healing and helping. Lord bless you all...