Kiss and tell

Earlier this week, we'd begun to enjoy a particular luxury afforded to us due to the complete recovery of your facial burns.

Kisses.

We'd never have kissed you on the forehead while your face was still healing. Fear of giving you an infection was too great. But now that your face looks like nothing more happened to you than a spa treatment, we kiss your forehead all the time. And a couple of days ago, you started raising your face to me after I'd kiss your forehead, and I realized you wanted a kiss, as Craig Barlow would say, "Right on the lips."

We are a kissing family. How nice to have this avenue of affection reopened to us. I see the look in your eyes after a kiss from one of us and you look so -- happy isn't the word, and neither is fulfilled -- peaceful? No, not quite. What's a word that describes the feeling that something which is rightfully yours and was stolen, has been restored? It is just one more thing added to your list of Can Do's: Smile, check. Kiss, check. Those two things are big parts of who you are, Daddy.

Status: O2 assistance down to 45% (they actually worked you as low as 40% today!), PEEP holding at 5. Sedative level: 2mg/hr LESS than yesterday. And you were doing great about staying calm and restoring calm after a round of coughs riled you up. You amaze me, father of mine. You and those around you who continue to hold you safe in their prayers.

That tube

Without divulging too much information to your adoring public, we'll just say that, although you must have a tube to help your lungs recover, there are certain places you do not like to have tubes. Not one little bit. And yesterday and today, you've let us know about it as best as you could. Well, Daddy, your nurses heard you loud and clear.

So, it is our great pleasure to inform you:
That
tube
is
gone.

End of day update: PEEP 8, O2 assistance 50%; chest x-rays revealed: IMPROVEMENT! And for that accomplishment, they're going to work your settings on the vent all night in an attempt to begin weaning you off of it. (This will be a gradual process. It will not all happen overnight.) We're keeping our fingers crossed for a good report in the morning.

But enough about that - what's up with your eye??

It's so absurd. To have been on pins and needles about the pneumonia, your fever, your trach, your ventilator... and finally, as all of that worry has reached a plateau for now, we've begun noticing other things.

Like your left eye. The bottom white of your eye is... puffing out along the bottom of your eyelid. And we've noticed it before, but then we were a bit swept up in worrying about your lungs. The night of the fire, your eyes suffered corneal abrasions. They've been treating it steadily and your corneas have all but cleared up. But you've got scleral edema, and now, since your lungs are starting to show steady improvement, we're back to worrying about it.

I consider this a success. Picking up where we left off before the 'P' word.

So there you are, a man who's escaped an inferno (with the help of the heroes at Station 19, thankyouverymuch); a man who's not only fighting his way through smoke inhalation injuries, but pneumonia, too; a man who's faced challenges at the cellular level, what with all the toxins that absorbed into his bloodstream. And here's Asia and me: Ick. What's wrong with his eye?

I don't know, Daddy. Is an eye trivial? I don't think so. I really want you to have healthy eyes. Just because you seem to be back from the brink doesn't mean we don't want as much of you as healthy as possible. We're grateful for every blessing that has come and still, we'll continue to ask for a healing of all your wounds.

We're glad for every new day, every new triumph, every new ick factor that shows us we're starting to surmount the life or death situations and notice a little scleral edema here and there.

End of day update: Temperature: 38.3 C; Oxygen assistance: 50%; PEEP: 10. Very, very good. Now, let's start bringing down the PEEP number, Daddio.