Back to the OR

The latest and greatest...Nathan will be headed back to the OR. As sad as it is to say, these are becoming familiar words. I'm almost to the point of becoming numb to the sting of all of the bad things that Nathan is enduring.

 I requested a care conference today. This is basically when all of the different medical divisions that are seeing to Nathan's care (e.g., cardiologists, surgeons, intensivists, social workers, etc.) come together to have a powwow to discuss the next plan of action. The deciding factor was that Nathan's pacemaker needs to come out. They feel that no amount of antibiotics can guarantee that the infection that lurks on the pacemaker can 100% be killed. Thus, it needs to be taken out. The question that remained was, do we need to put a temporary pacemaker in?

The answer is, we don't know. So, they decided to turn his pacemaker off today to see what he could do on his own. They will introduce some new meds to see if that can help the heart rate stay higher. When they turned it off he was maintaining in the 90s. Which is super amazing. However, the downfall is that he spiked a fever today; yes, he has a cold or the flu, because why not?! The fever could be what led to a higher heart rate. So, no one knows if he can sustain a good rate without a pacemaker. Only time will tell. Pending this information, we will go to the OR early next week. The silver lining is that maybe, just maybe his heart is in such a good place right now that it may not need a pacemaker ever again (I'm not holding my breath for this conclusion).

There are so many unknowns at this point. I do know that we are all at our wits end trying to figure out the puzzle that is Nathan. I'm so tired of seeing him suffer and be miserable. I'm tired of not knowing what challenge I'll face with the coming day. There has got to be a limit to how many hardships we'll be weighed down with. For the time being, we will face this new ordeal head on and with no fear. At this point, the time that I will be able to come back home is unknown. I guess we'll just take it one day at a time...slow and steady wins the race, right?