I haven't posted much in the past couple of days because not much has changed. We've had several boring days now, which is ok. Our biggest hurdle continues to be his lungs and getting off the ventilator. MD's had hoped to get him off last Friday or at least over the weekend, but as they tried to wean the ventilator Josiah showed signs of struggle. It's becoming very evident that his lung development, the major thing they warned us about, is really affecting Josiah. Because of Josiah's intact atrial septum (the wall between the upper two chambers of his heart)in-utero blood could not flow the way it needed to and would get backed up toward his lungs. Having this happen while his lungs were developing and growing caused them not to develop correctly. What the problem is exactly, I don't know, what I know is that his lungs just are not strong enough to keep up with his breathing at this time. And what we've been told is the only remedy at this point is time. Time for him to feed and grow.

They have started a new strategy for weaning off the vent or for exercising his lungs to make them stronger. Instead of steadily decreasing the breaths per minute until he can do it on his own. He now sits most of the day at a higher rate which allows him to rest well and then occasionally do what they call a sprint where they turn the vent rate way down for 30 mins. After 30 mins. they turn the rate way back up and let him rest again. They will gradually try to make the length of his "sprint" longer and at a lower rate. Hopefully, this method will strengthen Josiah's lungs more quickly. It worked great for our friend Tagg so maybe it'll work for us too!