The Story of Monday January 18th

I'm sitting in McDonalds on the first floor of CHLA, just spent a little bit of time with Reagan and going to go back and see him again in about an hour.

CHLA is both a sad and happy place at the same time.  Lots of sick children here, that's all they deal with.  You see them all over the place, moving about, I'm sure just trying to spend as much time as possible out of their hospital rooms.  McDonalds seems like a special place for them, a chance for some normalcy amid all the poking and prodding, tests and treatments, and scariness that must accompany an extended hospital stay.  It's sad because if they are here, it means that they are really sick and there is nothing sadder than sick little children.  But at the same time there's a bit of happiness because this hospital is one of the best for treating sick children.  In my experience so far, the doctors and the nurses here are absolutely fantastic.  They have treated Reagan as if he was their own, like they have a personal vested interest in his well-being.  The children sitting here in McDonalds, some of them in wheel-chairs, some of them being helped into the booths, to me at least it's a sign that they are getting better.  They are able to get up out of their rooms and for a little while do what kids do, what we all did when we were kids, go to McDonalds with our parents and have a happy meal.

I went and spent some time with Reagan this morning.  The treatment to put more surfactant in his lungs last night seems to be working.  His O2 numbers are way up, his CO2 numbers are way down, his blood pressure is up as well.  So far, he's responding well to the treatment and getting better, much better than when he was brought here.  He's still a very sick baby, but he's getting better.  They were running blood-gas tests on him every hour, but since he's shown the improvement they're only doing them every four hours now.  His next test is in about a half an hour, I'm going to give them a little bit of time to get the results back then check in again.  If he is still improving, I'll wait for the next test at 4pm, find out the results and if there is still improvement, I will think about heading home for a bit.  I really want to see Landon, and to see Hillary again.

I stayed at the Travel Lodge right by the hospital last night, first sleep in a bed since Tuesday, was kind of nice actually.  The sleep not the hotel.  The hospital isn't in what you would call the high rent district.  Was kind of releived that the hotel just charged for the whole night as opposed to by the hour, if you know what I mean.

Hillary says that Landon is improving as well.  They treated him with some additional surfactant as well and it seems to have helped.  His O2 and CO2 numbers aren't nearly as bad as Reagan's were, but still weren't where they should be.

That's all for now, thanks for all the kind words, and the prayers, more updates later.

Phil