06h53
Gabriel had a good night’s sleep, first with his mom, then with his dad.
His PICC was removed following yesterday’s blockage and temporarily replaced by a simple foot catheter, pending, I imagine, the fitting of a new PICC or another central access.
I’d like to take this opportunity to share a touching anecdote with you. Yesterday, a gentleman came to see Gabriel, visibly moved.
I asked him who he was. He told me he was part of the team that had installed the ECMO and that he had promised Gabriel to come back and congratulate him the day he ran out of tubes. And that day arrived!
Tests were taken this morning. We are waiting for the results and the report.
19h40
Sorry to write so late, it’s been a busy day at UTI.
But let me reassure you right away: Gabriel is fine! And I’ve got 3 bits of good news for you at the end of this post.
But first I’ll start with the “intense” and difficult part of this day. Because that’s what we do every day. It also serves as therapy for me to spread these words…
UTI remained closed for most of the day for 2 reasons:
The first reason is that today they had to place PICCs on several children, and a priori everything didn’t go as planned for some, and it’s still closed at this hour…
The second is that one of Gabriel’s neighbors has unfortunately passed away. She had been fighting for several days, and unfortunately passed away this morning…
We don’t tell you every time, but this week another child also passed away. His mother was close to Manuela.
This daily routine has become very complicated to manage.
We’re now the oldest members of UTI Cardio and we’ve seen too many things that shouldn’t exist…
You can’t help but be deeply moved when this happens.
Here, all the parents help each other. In a way, they’re all our children. And when we see that a child is unwell, we do our best to warn the parents or alert the carers. But when there are incidents, well, we feel that pain too…
It’s clearly a situation comparable to the war we live through every day.
And little by little, we become crazy, with post-traumatic syndromes and the “decompensation” that goes with them.
It’s time to get Gabriel out of here in top form!
I promised you 3 pieces of good news, so here they are:
The first piece of good news is that his blood results and X-ray are better today. The infection seems to be under control! Phew!
Second piece of good news: they gave him a PICC this afternoon and all went well, even if I heard he was a bit upset. But frankly, he’s got a right to be pissed off!
Third piece of good news: they removed the high-flow nasal cannula and replaced it with a conventional nasal cannula. Its saturation is between 95% and 100%, with oxygen set at 1 liter per minute (around 24%).
Now we’re praying for a quick 100% recovery, a return home, and that we never return to this hell!
Well done, Gabriel! We’re proud of you, and the whole world sends you the strength to keep on fighting!
