Please Continue to Pray for Bracey

"Dear Family and Friends,

Thank you for all of your prayers and support yesterday. Bracey went into surgery around 1:30pm. It lasted about 2 ½ hours, and then he went directly into the MRI which lasted for 3 hours. During the surgery he had another bronchoscope preformed. This showed that Bracey’s trachea malacia has gotten significantly worse in just three weeks. They gave us pictures of what his trachea looks like. A great portion of his trachea was collapsed. This is because his tissue around the trachea is super soft and he needs time to grow and strengthen it. They want to keep an eye on it to make sure that it doesn’t worsen. Bracey will start showing even more signs of wheezing and distress which will cause us to think that it has worsened. If it worsens, then they will probably need to put in a trachea tube. They do not suspect that it will get to that point. The doctor said that when he is crying it causes it to collapse even more. So we will need to try and keep him from getting too upset.

They have begun to slow down his pain medication to allow him to be able to breath on his own so that they can take him off of the ventilator. At the moment, he is becoming more aware of these foreign objects in his body (the ventilator tube and the newest addition his G-tube) and is trying to cry. Hopefully by 10:30 a.m. they will have taken him off of the ventilator and will begin to feed him this afternoon. Everyone we talk to tells us a different time table about when we will be able to go home, so we really have no idea. We suspect it will be until at least Monday or could even be well into next week.

Yesterday evening was difficult for Bracey and us. While a nurse was trying to take his vital signs, Bracey got frightened and flailed about, pulling his breathing tube out a bit. The nurse tried to push it back in while maintaining her main objective, taking his temperature. Because Bracey was still under heavy medication, his body was unable to breathe on its own. The situation escaladed to having many doctors and nurses in the room trying to reinsert the tube while keeping him breathing and alive. After about 20 -25 minutes they finally got the tube reinserted and Bracey was much more stable.

The other tough moment was yet another IV. When doctors prepare to take someone off of the ventilator they feel most comfortable having 2 access points by iv just in case there is an emergency and one of the iv’s go bad. As we have been figuring out, it is very difficult for anyone to find a good place for them. He already has one on his head and now they have decided to put the 2nd in his neck which is a much larger artery than in his foot or even his head. Hours later Angela realizes that there is a great deal of swelling surrounding this iv at his neck. Bracey was stirring more and more and so the nurse realizes that the iv fluid is not going into his artery but was building up in his neck. She immediately added the meds from his neck into the iv in his head so that Bracey would calm down. They have since taken that iv out and have not put another one in.

Thank you so much for your prayers and thoughts throughout this whole situation.

In His Hands,

Torrey, Angela, and Bracey"