Jack Jensen's Blog: What a day

Thursday, July 9, 2009

What a day

Today was crazy. My iv came undone when I was getting up and blood poured out the end and all over the floor and me. As soon as I realized it, I clamped it off. The nurse was able to flush the line and I showered to get clean. When she went to rehook me she realized the iv was 3 days old and apparently they have to remove and place a new iv every 3 days. Seriously? I thought they left them in until they didn't flush. I'm not thrilled with have to get this done every 3 days. It makes me have even more respect for Jack. He's much braver than I am!

The day went slowly but the baby was doing great. Around 6 pm her heart started to race around 180-190 beats per minute but eventually calmed down. Apparently she likes to scare me around that time.

The crappy part about tonight was that they just moved another patient into my room. Normally, I'm a fairly social person but the lack of privacy is already making me crazy. I don't even want to turn on the TV or talk on the phone. We were also planning on having James stay the weekend with me but now that won't work. I'm really agitated over this.

The only other news I have is that while I was bored today I finally went online to check out Twitter. I added a Twitter section on the right hand part of this blog so I can text updates in from my phone without having to pull out the computer. It's pretty easy. I can see how people get addicted to it.

Well, I guess I'll get going. Should be fun trying to sleep tonight. At least the baby is well and that's all that really matters (although it'd be nice to have my sanity and privacy back).

~Vic

4 comments:

Gina said...: omg!! We are so much alike!! When I was on bed rest in the hospital with Wyatt, that same thing happened to me!! I got a roommate and it felt weird to watch TV or talk on the phone.... I so feel for you.... just think about the AWESOME prize at the end:)); July 9, 2009 at 9:55 PM
Joe LaSala said...: Hope you can get some sleep tonight!
Catching up on your posts... wish we could give you a hug.

(Also thanks for listing me as a favorite blog (though as of tonight I only have 2 posts :) )); July 9, 2009 at 10:06 PM
Cindy said...: That sucks about the roommate and your weekend sleepover plans being nixed. Hang in there!

Oh, and your hat looks awesome.; July 9, 2009 at 10:20 PM
*super dude and super dog* said...: I'm still very upset for you about the roommate situation. I want to drive up there and find you some privacy! Try to enjoy your weekend.; July 10, 2009 at 5:26 AM

Post a Comment

Jack's Diagnosis and Recovery

At our 19 week ultrasound Jack was diagnosed with CDH. One week later James and I went to Children's National Medical Center in Washington, D.C. for more extensive analysis. We had a fetal MRI and saw that his hernia was on the left side (the most common) and at that time his liver was 'up' or in his chest. His heart was pushed to the right in his chest and he had a normal sized right lung and a very small left lung (about 1/5 the normal size). Overall his CDH was classified as severe with a Lung to Head (LHR) ratio of 0.8. His echocardiogram showed that his heart was beating strong and there was no underlying congenital heart defect. His amnio was also normal. The prognosis was 20-50% chance of survival at birth. The struggle we faced with this diagnosis was that there is little correlation between prenatal diagnostic test results and outcome at birth. Some babies with mild defects do poorly and some with severe defects pull through and do very well. All we could do was try to be optimistic and hope and pray that Jack would be a strong baby and fight hard. On August 20, 2007 John Verner Jensen "Jack" was born by C-section at The Johns Hopkins Hospital. He weighed 6 pounds 11 ounces and was 20 inches long. Within hours of birth he was placed on ECMO (heart-lung bypass). He had a 10 day run on ECMO and went to his hernia repair surgery on this machine. He was missing 90% of his left diaphragm, had his entire stomach, spleen, and parts of his small and large intestines and liver in his chest and he required a gortex patch. Jack came out of surgery off ECMO but with the cannulas still in place until later that night. He had a really hard night after surgery and we nearly lost him. We were later told his blood gases should have been unsurvivable and that it was pure will and not medicine that saved him. After 81 days in hospital we brought Jack home breathing room air and needing only an NG (naso-gastric) feeding tube. After 27 days home he reherniated and we had to go back for emergency surgery at Johns Hopkins. His awesome surgeons literally patched him back up and after another 16 days in hospital he returned home on Dec 21, 2007 - just in time for his first Christmas. Since then Jack has tackled his eating issues and is NG-tube free! He does not require any medication. We are extremely grateful for his incredible medical team and all his friends and family for their support, kind words, thoughts and prayers.

Jack's CarePage chronicles his day-to-day journey from diagnosis to approximately 6 months old (before we started blogging). See the link below.