It was a BIG day for Ella.
 
At 10:15am, they decided to take her off CPAP and let her try the nose cannula!!! Her oxygen support is set at 500. Maybe the third take on the nose cannula will be her ticket.
 
They are still feeding her at 64ccs over 1 hour, but now they are venting her g-tube over 1 hour too. The goal is to give feeds all at once (a bolus feed) and let her g-tube vent for 5-10 minutes. This is what we will do when we take her home.
 
Ella woke up when she heard our voices this evening. Dad decided to hold her first and was enjoying his time with the Bun. It was a bit concerning because it seemed that it was taking a lot of effort for her to breathe. You could visibly see and hear her breathing rapidly. She sounds like she might have some congestion in her nose too, which can’t be helping.
 
The labored breathing is not different than the last 2 times that she has been on the nose cannula. However, the biggest difference is that when she fell asleep in my arms tonight, and when we put her down before we left the NICU, her stats were awesome while she was sleeping (heart rate around 160, saturations pegged at 100, breathing still high at 80 breaths per minute). We have never seen stats that strong while she has been on the nose cannula.
 
We are hopeful that she will not have to go back to CPAP and that she will be able to tolerate this change. Maybe it will just take some more time for her to gain strength over the coming days.
 
The remainder of this week will be very telling. The first time that she tried the nose cannula, it was only 24 hours and her left lung collapsed. The second time, it was 5 days before she started showing major signs of distress and by 7 days, she was re-intubated because both lungs had collapsed. We’re hopeful that this time will be different.
 
We did not see Jasmine and Chris today, although they were supposed to take Jonathan off ECMO. At this point, we are not sure what to think. Please continue to pray for him and his family.
 
Par is making amazing progress. At this rate, he may even get to go home before Christmas! We are still not sure what type of activity is going on between him and Ella after-hours, but as you may have read on the Rich’s blog, Par’s mitten was under Ella’s crib last night! Mysterious…
 
Please continue to pray for Ella’s strength. It would be amazing for her to not have any major set backs. She deserves that much for her first Christmas!
 
Ultimately, we know that His plan is the best.
 
Psalm 27:14
Wait for the Lord;
be strong and take heart,
and wait for the Lord.