Happy New Year from Kaden!!

Happy New Year - From Kaden and the 2 girls in his life,Brooke and Regan xx

Kaden in 2007

kaden at Nannys

Next Plan

The week before Christmas we had a meeting with the surgeon and the plan is Kaden has had the NG tube for 5 months now so they are going to remove it and do a G tube instead and a fundalplication at the same timeto stop his reflux.We are dreading this as its another big op for our boy to go through and a weeks stay in hospital with sometime in HDU.This is booked for the Friday 4th January 2008.There's one thing about the g tube i'm looking forward to and thats getting rid of Kadens nose tube-so we can see our little boys face properly!

Meeting with the Surgeon

We plodded along with the continual feeding by the pump,but Kaden would become really unsettled and arch his back and kick his legs early evening and during the night.I spoke with the Dietition and she said she'd call us back.
When she called back she said she had spoke to our surgeon who would like to have a chat with us.

Still Struggling

Kaden still stuggled to put on weight so the next plan was continuis pump feeding for 20 hours a day which seemed to work for a start then during the night he seems to be more unsettled and is sick a good few times.
Kaden was back in hospital again on the 20th November as he was really unsettled that day,so i booked an appointment at the doctors.She took one look down below and sent us up to A&E as Kaden had a Hernia.
Kaden stayed in that night and was operated on the next day and let home the following day!
What Next!!

Back in Hospital

In November they decided they would try feeding Kaden overnight smaller amounts every hour by a pump to see if that would stay down better.We stayed over night and i got shown how to use the pump overnight and we were to take the pump home with us.
The following day they did a bareuim meal on Kaden to make sure his stomach was where it should be and Thankfully it was.

Feeding Time

Once at home feeding time became a nightmare.Kaden within 2 weeks wouldn't look at a bottle so every feed became a tube feed.He had to be fed 4 hourly even during the night as he was struggling to gain weight.We went to the Neo-Natal every week to have him weighed and sometimes they would check his blood gasses which seemed to be fine.They changed his milk to SMA High Energy which had more calories in each carton.Even then he still seemed to struggle.Between one hospital appointment and another they upped his medication as he has real bad reflux and was losing alot of his feeds.I'd stand for 3/4hour tube feeding during the day and 10 minutes later the whole feed was up again.

Daddy Bathing Kaden

Once home and settled Mike gave Kaden his First Bath at home - which Kaden seemed to enjoy!

Kaden coming Home

Mike wanted to take Kaden Home in A Hummer Limo - so thats what he did!

Not that Kaden noticed!!

Kaden's Next Move

Kaden was moved after a week in HDU and moved into the pre discharge room where he stayed for a further week.Kadens Feeding not going too well as he gets tired easily so they are doing 1 tube feed to 1 bottle feed.He wasn't coping with that so we gave him 2 tube feeds to 1 bottle feed and the most he took from a bottle was about 50mls.

They spoke about letting Kaden home with a NG tube as he was taking forever to feed,they had him on medication for reflux and gaviscon in his feeds.

Kaden was finally discharged from hospital 6 weeks to the day he was born Wednesday 5th September 2007.

Kaden's 1st Family photo

Kaden's 1st family hug without the c pap on - which they removed for 5 minutes for us to give him a cuddle while we were all there! We' re blowing oxygen out of the green pipe towards his nose and mouth.

Try,Try and Try again

Time to try Kaden off the ventilator again,this time after a few attempts it was time to change his machine to the c pap machine which Kaden remained on for about 2 weeks.

other cdh babies

Imogen-http://immiedee.blogspot.com/
Skyla - http://skylacdhbaby.blogspot.com/
Wyatt-http://wyattjameskoger.blogspot.com/
Jack - http://babyjackjensen.blogspot.com

Kaden Our Fighter

One Step Forward & Two Back

We took each day as it came - About a week after Kadens operation they tried to wean him off the ventilator,but were unsuccessful.His Blood gasses kept deteriorating to an unsafe value so they put him straight back on the ventilator.

One Day At A Time

Each day brought its ups and downs for Kaden from Day one.Post Kadens operation they said the first 48 hours were crusial ,the surgeon said that now all the organs had been moved out of the chest his main concern was the way the blood was pumping to the heart he hoped that it wouldn't start shunting to the duct that is suppost to close at birth and could cause problems.

Thankfully this didn't happen and the first 24 hours seemed to be stable.Then the following 48 hours Kaden seemed quite unstable with what looked like a fluid build up in the chest,so they removed some fluid to check and make sure that it wasn't a fluid which they called kyle which can be hard to treat and would mean stopping feeding him for a little while,and starting antibiotics which they did anyway.

They did some x-rays over the next few days to find what looked like air bubbles in his chest - and they wanted to investigate further.So they put some dye down Kaden to find out if any of his bowel was still above his diaphram which thankfully was not!

We think when they took some fluid from his chest it had caused the air bubbles.But also Kaden did have bugs growing in the line in his neck so they removed the line.

Kadens Stay In Hospital

Kaden spent 6 weeks in hospital,4 of those he was in Intensive Care - with 1 step forward and 2 back.He had his first Life Saving operation at 1 day old to repair the hole in his diaphram and move all his organs back down below where they belong.In his chest he had his stomach,his spleen,left lobe of his liver,bowel and intestines which left his lower half of his tummy very sunk in.Kaden has one reasonable size right lung and a small left lung.

This is a picture of Kaden after his life saving surgery which lasted 5 hours(The longest 5 hours of our lives)

Kaden's Long Road Ahead

This is Kaden roughly 2 hours after his arrival by c-setion on 25th July 2007 weighing 5lbs 12oz at 39 + 1 weeks gestation-he's on a ventilator and all wired up.

Kadens Birthday Wednesday 25th July 2007

With a date set for delivery Wednesday 25th july 2007 - We headed up to hospital in tears at the unknown of what lay ahead.Once we arrived at the hospital i was prepped for my c-section which was scheduled for the morning.We had to think positive thoughts for the sake of our other 2 children,who were desperate for their baby brother to appear.We also had to explain to our 2 girls how ill their brother was and might not live on his arrival - as no one could give us the answers until he was born.

Thankfully Kaden entered the world at 10.41 a.m weighing 5lbs 12 oz and managed a little cry - before being rushed off to the neo-natal unit.

They told Mike they would call in an hour or so for him to go and see the baby.While i was in the recovery room Mike eventually got the long awaited call about 2 hours later to go and see our son.By this time the girls had been dropped off at the hospital to see their brother for the first time,the moment we had all been waiting for.