All At Once, The World Can Overwhelm You...

Today was a big day for TEAM RHODES, Sophia had her breathing tube taken out at 8:30 this morning to see how affect the previous surgery was in opening her airway. Once the vent tube was out, Sophia had a tough time settling into her breathing. In order to give her the best fighting chance, they gave her a quick breathing treatment and vapotherm. All in all her oxygen stats looked good and her CO2 wasn't too high, but within the hour you could tell she was just working too hard and her baby chest was contracting so hard to keep up. It was not worth the risk to make her keep struggling like that so we decided it was best for her needs and comfort to put the vent tube back. I will say one thing, Sophia gave it her very best try and mommy was proud of her for that. Mommy also knows if she can make it easier for Sophia to breathe then maybe mommy could breathe easier too. So now we our on a new path to getting home and that path begins with a tracheotomy and a g-tube. Much to my surprise, the doctors are ready to move on this quickly and have scheduled her surgery for tomorrow afternoon. She will be put under again and will be having two operations at once in order to save her from having to go under a 5th time. Tomorrow will make surgeries 4 and 5 in her 6 weeks of life. John and I are very nervous for tomorrow and for what lays ahead for our family. Having the trache is going to mean many different things and changes for our family. Luckily for Sophia, she will never know any different. I do want to say they are very certain the trache or g-tube will not be permanent things but like many of their answers, only time will tell as she grows and gets stronger. I just can not believe we have gotten to this point so quickly. Perhaps, this in a way with the doctors promptness is a good thing because it keeps me from sitting and worrying about it for too long. On the contrary, I am going to be worrying about it for much longer once it is in my child. I am so apprehensive for the trache because it will mean we are going to be going home on machines and monitors not just with diaper bags and balloons. This also means that we are no longer just mommy and daddy, but we our now Sophia nurses and medical experts. We will have to be trained on her care and what to do in case of emergencies. I DO NOT doubt that John and I can handle this. We are handling this and doing what we need to do for the care of our daughter. We are just so overwhelmed by the nature of it all and how it got from driving to the hospital to have Sophia to still longing for that care ride back home. So for now, we and Sophia are yet again preparing for a very big day, the biggest day yet in terms of her surgeries, and from there we will prepare for the rest of our lives or at least one day at a time or perhaps even one hour at a time...

The surgery is scheduled for tomorrow at noon. We again would appreciate as many good vibes, positive thoughts, encouraging cheers, and powerful PRAYERS for our baby girl tomorrow.

With all the love in the world,
John, Amanda and Sweet Sophia