Tube Clogged

Well, we have had an exciting weekend! Toby's appointment with the GI doctor on Friday went well. She gave us some ideas for relieving the air in his belly and since then it's been much better, and we're slowly increasing his food intake up to 42 ml an hour for 20 hours. Saturday we had a picnic with the moms group at our church, and our day nurse was able to go with us and Toby. It was great; our weather hasn't been humid this week/weekend, and it has been wonderful to be able to take him out places.

This morning while I was giving Toby a medication through his GJ tube, it got clogged. It's a medication he's on because they found a bacteria in his urine culture this week, so they're treating it with this really thick and yucky medicine. We ended up having to take him to the hospital (Radiology) to replace the tube. To explain a little further, the G-tube or Gastro tube is a larger white tube that goes into his stomach. The J-tube (or jejunum) tube is a smaller tube threaded through the big G-tube that goes into his small intestine or jejunum. It was the J-tube that was clogged, I tried flushing it with water several times and even tried Coke, and nothing worked. Thankfully we weren't there too long, and now he has a brand new one for our trip to Michigan. He still has to receive this medication for 2 more days, so pray that it doesn't get clogged again. An answer to prayer that we had this week, is the granulation tissue around his G-tube is going away and NOT coming back. On a tip from a new friend, we stopped putting gauze underneath this round plastic circular disc that holds the tube flush with his skin, and since then we have had no scar tissue. Yeah!! We have lots to do this week before we head to Michigan; feeling excited and a little overwhelmed, but I know it will get done. Have a great evening!