Thursday was a difficult day to interpret. It started with a visit from Ira's neonatologist. He has held off on talking to us for quite some time giving the impression that he's not too personable or his bedside manners aren't too polished. I was relieved to hear him say that he wanted to make sure he was on the same page as Ira's surgeon before he talked with us. He went on to paint a grim picture. He wasn't optimistic in the slightest and his nonverbals spoke louder than his verbals. The summation of what he said was that Ira wasn't getting any worse but wasn't making any progress either. In lieu of that, they were going to start weaning the nitric oxide (NO) soon just to see how Ira would respond.

Just a couple of hours later Ira's blood/gas test came back with numbers we had never received. The numbers indicated that Ira was doing work on his own and probably didn't need the NO or ventilator. They immediately brought in a doctor and we started the weaning of the NO. There was an excitement in the nurse and doctor as they went to work to manipulate the machines.

It was hard to make sense of the early morning conversation and the blood/gas test that looked so good.

They turned down Ira's NO and reconfigured Ira's ventilator where Ira would be breathing on his own with help from the ventilator. I got to see Ira breathe on his own for the first time in his life. He was working so hard and working muscles and parts of his body he has never used.

Anyway, they turned off the NO tonight. Ira didn't seem to respond well but we got him calmed down. His ventilator was turned up a bit more but that was expected. This is a huge step and we're anxious to see how his night goes.