blessingsOn January 31 Jacob had surgery to repair a congenital defect in his cervical spine. His first and second cervical discs never fused together as they should have. This left him with an unstable neck and was causing some swelling to his spinal cord. We knew the surgery would be long and he might have to have some extra blood. What happened was worse than we could have imagined. When the anesthesiologist tried to put the breathing tube in she had a very difficult time. After a six hour surgery we were told that the actual surgery went very well and he only needed a minimal amount of blood. He did have problems due to the traumatic intubation and was going to have to go to the PICU on a ventilator. They explained that he should only have to be on the ventilator for a few days and then would be weaned off.
Although it was very hard for us to see him so still on a ventilator we had hope that he would be able to overcome this obstacle and we could move on. By Sunday February 3rd he had weaned on the vent enough for the doctors to try to take the tube out. They had an anesthesiologist come to the PICU to do this as they wanted to have every safety measure in place. This doctor wanted me to wait in the waiting room. I was upset as I wanted to be there for Jacob. I went to the waiting room and called my mom to let her know how mad I was and then called Mike to tell him what was happening as I did this I noticed that the time they gave me had passed. I called Mike back and told him something was not right and that he should rush up to the hospital. Then I called back to the PICU and asked if I could come back the secretary stalled me and then she finally said I could come back. As I entered the ICU and walked to Jacob's bed I witnessed something that no parent should ever have to witness. There were five doctors and countless nurses and respiratory therapists surrounding my son. My son was not breathing and then I heard the doctor say there is no heart rate resume compressions. How could this be happening???? I walked up to my son and started to rub his leg. Try as I might words of comfort or of any kind would not come. As I rubbed his leg and they continued to resuscitate him I called Mike and told him to hurry because they were doing chest compressions. It seemed like forever but they were quickly able to reintubate Jacob and get his heart beating again. Mike soon arrived and the anguish he felt was so tangible and all we could do in our shock was to hold onto each other. Jacob started to become more stable through the day. He had a stable night and then on Monday we found that things could get worse than they were. He had to have two chest tubes and throughout the whole day the nurses, RT's and doctors were having to do life saving measures to keep his blood pressure up and his breathing going. They even changed the type of ventilator to an oscillator.
By 11 pm the doctor finally came to Mike and I and said we have done everything we can we have no more room if he gets worse there is nothing more we can do. He told us we should call our family together as he could not tell if Jacob was going to make it. After the initial shock and devastation of the news we called our Bishop and asked if he could come up and bring our three oldest girls to us. We called my parents and Mike's sister. We had not brought the girls up to see Jacob because we wanted to protect them from seeing their brother so sick when he has always been so full of life. Now we could no longer protect them. I could only think this can't be I can not go on with out my son! Why at their young ages do my daughters have to go through this? How is Mike going to handle this? The nurse told us our family had arrived. Mike went out to talk with the girls and I stayed with Jacob. Bishop Tillman and his wife came in and Rosa gave me a hug that spoke a thousand words from one mother to a mother who was in anguish at the thought of losing one of her sons. Then in came my girls and I tried to help them feel comfortable as they talked to and caressed there little brother. Mom and Dad were there and it was so comforting. Johannah, Mike's sister was there, Jennifer and Karin were there as well. The Bishop asked if he could give Jacob a blessing. Being scared and in shock I could not accept that this might be his last blessing in this life. Then Mike, Dad, Bishop Tillman and Brother Denti placed their hands on Jacob's head and the Bishop did not give Jacob a blessing of release. I can not remember all of the words but I do know that he said that the Lord knew what was best for Jacob and it would be His will and in His time. Although I did not know if this meant I would be able to continue being Jacob's mom in this earthly existence I was comforted by the blessing. After this everyone left and Jacob slowly continued to stabilize through the night and actually came off all of his blood pressure meds. He remained stable through the rest of the week but although stable he had not made much progression. Cont. on next post
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