2020 08 14

Day 9 Status: 

Alex is still in a very deep sleep. Many of the emergency medications have been taken away (which is a good sign). He has several IV lines providing him with sedation, pain relief, antibiotic and fluids. He has a respirator that is providing his oxygen. His vital signs and the eeg (The equipment that monitor his brain) are somewhat stable most of the time. (Alex likes to throw us off guard so he makes all of the machines and alarms go buzz, beep and ding pretty darned often). The vital signs and the monitors show that his brain is begining to wake up, at this time the doctors believe that it is best that he remain at rest and recover a little longer before starling or waking himself up too quickly. 

Alex has not yet opened his eyes and he still does not squeeze our finger nor wiggle his toes. (He did a very little of that on last Thursday night...8 days ago) We know that he is in deep sleep right now (in part) due to the sedation medicine. Today they will continue to monitor many of his vital signs, eeg (brain activity), his fluid input and output. They will make a 3rd attempt at inserting an NJ tube. The NJ tube is yet another tube that would go into his body. This one would go in through the nose. This tube is important to start getting nutrition to the appropriate place. Nutrition to a place where it is safe to be when he starts to wake up. This is all tricky because they want to bi pass the stomach so that if he startles or has gag reflex when he wakes up, they want to make every attempt to keep him from throwing up. He currently has an oxygen tube in his mouth and down his airway, so vomit would have nowhere to escape his body and could end up in his lungs (we need to avoid that). So far he has been taking forced medications and clear IVs only (the ivs have what he needed for the past week, but he needs to start getting different nutrition). 

Today we hope for another step in the right direction. Every member of the several teams that are working with Alex appear to take every caution, and take every direction toward making the appropriate change for his improvement. The majority of them present themselves as strong and confident in what they are doing (especially the bedside nurses that touch every single machine, button, wire, iv line, medication, band aid, for what is truly an exhausting nonstop 12 hours at a time)  to make him stable. 

All of these professionals present themselves as strong and courageous which give us faith and hope.  

We know Alex can do this we have that faith! We know Alex can do his part... 

We see and want to believe that all of the professionals around him are doing their part which then gives us hope. 

We look forward to a better day today. We have faith in a better day today. 

Prayer and energies: 

Hebrews 11:1 "Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see" 

Proverbs 3: 5-6 Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; In all your ways submit to him and he will make your paths straight. 

John; 12. Jesus said, "I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life." 

Cycling analogy. 

We are somewhere in the first couple miles of this ride. The adrenaline is pumping and the mind is in that brain foggy blur with deep down question of "what the hell is going on?" It is like that early raw morning where the suns not up, we are cold and our body still has those uncontrollable trembles. We have not yet woken up, but we are here. We have never ridden in this darkness nor this kind of weather before.....it is the darkest of mornings and it has the thickest, densest fog that we have ever encountered.  We cant see the road and we are in that uncomfortable zone where we don't know whether our bodies or the weather will warm us. We truly don't know what the day ahead will bring. We weren't given a map nor do we know the terrain, so we can only take the challenge when it presents itself.  We are most thankful that we clipped in...this we know..  We can pedal... it is still dark...it is still foggy...it is still pretty damned cold...but we can pedal. We have faith, we have trust and we have confidence. We are strong. We look ahead but can truly only see inches above the front wheel.  Its pretty damned dark...we cant see...but We confide and trust God to help us take, accept, and come out of each upcoming straight and each upcoming turn safely. We have that faith and we trust because we know that with each turn we truly do get closer to that time on the clock where the sun will have to rise...the fog will have to lift and then we know that we will be able to see.