Tuesday Night (January 10)

"You take the good, you take the bad, you take it all, and there you have the facts of life!  It's the facts of life!"  Anybody remember that show?  That was theme song to the Facts of Life.  Tonight, I have good news and bad news.

We're going to start with the good news (because I want to).  The good news is that they did another echocardiogram on his heart this morning and it showed that the pda was "small."  I haven't gotten to talk to the doctor about it yet, but I think what he said last time was that if it would become smaller that they would not do surgery.  So I am hoping that this means that it will soon close completely and that we can move on past that issue. 

So on to the bad news:  He does have the infection around the tube in his throat.  They caught it early and he is showing no signs of illness.  His labs and vitals look great.  The doctors and nurses keep telling me how normal it is for a baby with a ventilator to get a little infection like that.  They will have him on antibiotics for 1 week and then it should be gone and he will likely have the vent out by then so hopefully it will not return.  They also found out today that he has a MRSA infection too.  This was found in his nasal cavity.  They said that he is a carrier only and is not sick from it.  They highly doubt that he will get sick from it.  MRSA is a type of staph infection and a large percentage of the general public are carriers and do not even know it.  He got it from somebody.  It could have been me or Jason or who knows who.  If it was me or Jason we had no idea that we could even have it.  It is a bacteria that lives in people's noses or skin.  So while he has it, everybody that comes in the room (except me) wears a yellow gown and gloves.  Each night for the next ten nights, they will give Silas a special bath to kill any MRSA on his skin, and they will rub special medicine on his nose.  And that's it.  It sounded scary to me at first but the nurses act like it is no big deal.  They act like that about everything though.  They keep telling me that Silas is a perfectly normal 25 weeker and to be patient and we will start seeing progress in a few more weeks. 

I skyped with the girls tonight from Silas' hospital room and the girls and Grandma got to watch the nurse give him a bath.  I love Skype.  Carissa said her leg didn't hurt at all today.  Maleah said she had a good day so all is well back at home.  Good night from St. Louis!