And We're Back...

Just when we thought we were in the clear to unpack our hospital bags and settle into our new routine with the g-tube and pump, Matthew decided to throw us a new curve ball...

He pulled out his own g-tube.

Yesterday morning I hooked him up for his morning feeding and he began screaming hysterically. I paused the feed, vented him, gave him gas drops and it seemed to do the trick. Until I restarted the feed, then the tears started all over again.

We had an appointment to see his new gastroenterologist to follow up on the Nissen, g-tube placement and to see how he was doing on erythromycin for gastroparesis. I called and rescheduled because of his behavior wouldn't let me travel with him safely due to possible seizures.

I continued getting him ready to leave for our now later appointment and started to clean his g-tube site and change his gauze when I saw this:

I may be a newbie to this whole feeding tube thing, but I do know enough to know that it shouldn't look like that.

I called the nurse back to see whether or not to bring him in or go to the ER.  She advised to stop feeds and come in so the doctor could assess and then send us to the ER.  As soon as I showed the doctor the picture and he saw that the tube itself was not able to be manipulated, he sent us over to the radiology department at the hospital and had the pediatric surgery department that did Matt's initial surgery meet us there.

Radiology results were inconclusive, but when dye was injected into the feeding tube Matt began to scream again and his abdomen began to swell again. The surgeon consulted with the gastro team again and decided the next step would be a sedated endoscopy with both teams present to fix anything they found.

The procedure took about an hour, most of it involving sedating Matt. Sure enough, the endoscopy showed that Matt had pulled his tube hard enough to disconnect it. The surgeon jumped in to take out the bad tube and lucky for us, he was able to place a new tube in the same site as the previous tube with no further surgery needed. Thank God we caught it early, it could have turned into peritonitis and been fatal.

So, that all happened Monday afternoon and night. We have spent the past three days getting his feed schedule back to normal, treating pain from the procedure, and fighting off a tube site infection with antibiotics. With any luck, we will get sprung tomorrow.

Life with our sweet boy is anything, but dull!