Wednesday, May 7th

Luckily, Papa and Dallas had a pretty quiet evening, despite Papa finding a good basketball game to watch!

During morning rounds, it was confirmed that the cardiac and hematology teams plan to repeat and re-evaluate an echocardiogram next week, to ensure the thrombus/cast in the heart is either unchanged or improved. In the meantime, the blood marker for the blood thinner she’s on looks good. There’s also no sign of bacteria from her previous blood cultures, so today should be the last day of antibiotics — a small win!

When PT/OT came in, they noted that Dallas had good eye tracking right from the start and gave a squeeze while holding their hand. Compared to yesterday’s session on the bench, her legs seemed more stable and didn’t flail outward as much. They also observed that her right ankle and foot stretches felt easier or more relaxed today. Dallas was able to hold onto a small ball or object briefly before letting it go. It’s not a big grip, but it’s something. She also moved her fingers quite a bit during the session.

Since she completed seven days of bowel rest with nothing going into her belly — to help with the Pneumatosis/NEC — a new NG tube was placed this afternoon, and feeds were reintroduced at a slow rate of 10 mL/hr. We’ll see how she does with it, and will likely repeat abdominal X-rays in the morning to check in.

Later in the afternoon, we got Dallas back in her chair for a change of pace. There was lots of movement — squeezing her hands, moving her feet, and signing “yes” by lifting her wrist. It’s almost as if things are starting to slowly come back online, and she’s realizing more and more of what she’s capable of doing. We’re hopeful that today’s increase in body movements might just be the catalyst we’ve been so patiently waiting for — one that leads the charge toward her recovery. As her shirt says… “Girl you got this!“

“Take the first step in faith. You don’t have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step.” — Martin Luther King Jr.

« Tuesday, May 6th

Thursday, May 8th »