Please keep those prayers coming, and thank you all for your love and concern for our boy.  According to the latest chest x-ray and report from the attending Physician, Bennett's lungs appear to have slightly improved, although "very little."  Still, this is good news and means things are possibly heading in the right direction!  Evidently, one of the possibilities for why this infection has remained so long is that when the infection/bacteria die they release even more toxins.  It's not that the anitibiotics are not working, but rather its the infection "multiplying" as it dies off, as if it is trying with all its power to do as much damage as it possibly can before its time runs out. The Doctors and nurses aren't for sure that this is what is happening, but they are hopeful that the antibiotics are finally beginning to take hold.   

There's also been some very small traces of blood in the urine, but as of now the Doctors are not terribly concerned.  In addition, this morning the nurses told me that Bennett would probably be given medication to prevent ulcers.  I guess if I'd had all of this done to me over the course of a week then I'd have a few ulcers too!

One of the best analogies a nurse used with me was the tightrope.  The key is to achieve a balance.  Any slight movement in one direction can cause the whole body to follow.  As soon as you move or lean one direction, you need to be immediately prepared to move part of the body or flex a particular muscle in a particular way in order to get the body back up straight.  It's very similar to what's going on in the NICU with Bennett.  One move in one direction will cause the staff to treat him one way and move him back straight, but that same movement can cause him to lean over in another direction, and so another treatment or method has to be used to ensure he stays back up on the rope.  And so the cycle continues, until you're finally safe and sound on the other side.  You're constantly moving forward, but it's a balancing act the entire way.

We thank you for walking this tightrope with us.

Love,

Travis, Kelly, and Bennett   

My call to the NICU this morning reminded me of the first lesson I learned about the NICU - every day is a new day.  It could be a good day, and it could be a bad day.  This is normal and is to be expected.  The report this morning from the NICU is that Bennett's lungs have not responded (yet) to the medicine to help his lungs.  They have given him 2 doses, and they will probably give him a third (and most likely final) dose later today.  The infection has an extremely tight hold on his lungs, so please pray for the medicine to break the strength of the infection.  As a dad, I want to do everything I can to fight this infection for him, and it hurts so much to see him struggle so much, but our boy continues to fight like a champion.  I know you would be proud of him, as I am and tell him daily, to see him fight like he does.

Kelly continues to heal and is resting as much as possible.  Bennett just LOVES to hear the sound of his mommy's voice, so I love knowing that she'll be by his side today.  She hopes to be able to go to the NICU sometime today, and then we'll both head back later this evening.

I hope each of you have a great Monday (as great as Mondays can be, right?!).  Thank you again for lifting our son up in prayer.

Love,

Travis, Kelly, and Bennett  

Bennett is urinating great!  In fact, he's urinating so well and so much that the Doctors and nurses have requested the prayers to be "re-directed" towards his lungs instead.  His lungs are still very infected, so they really need the prayers right now.  Please pray for Bennett to urinate "just the right amount" and for the antibiotics to fight this infection in his lungs.

Overall, Bennett is in stable condition.  He opened his eyes a bit this morning and we sang and read some to him.  It has been a great Lord's day with our son, and I'm looking forward to some more singing later tonight to close it out.  Thanks for all the great song suggestions!  I sang a lot of them, and I think Bennett really likes them.  For those who have asked about singing Rocky Top, I actually have not sung it to him as of yet.  I just think that if I sing it now then he'll get way too excited and then his heart rate will go way too high and then I'll have to leave again!!   

Thank you all for your love and concern for our precious boy.  He's holding strong, and he's fighting.  Man, is he fighting!  Please continue to pray for his lungs, the potential for bleeding, and for strength and guidance for the wonderful medical staff that cares for him daily. 

Also, his new buddy Peter seems to be holding strong as well, so please continue your prayers for him.  I'm hoping that one day he and Bennett will be able to start throwing the ball to each other across their beds.  When the nurses and Doctors aren't looking, of course ;)

Love,

Travis, Kelly, and Bennett

Please continue your prayers for Bennett's lungs.  The infection, combined with the affects of his pneumonia, are really taking a toll on his little lungs.  Beginning this afternoon, the Doctors and nurses began to give Bennett a drug (I can't remember the name of it right now, but it's normally given to premature babies) to help open up his lungs and clear out the infection.  The staff is hoping that after a day or two of these treatments Bennett's lungs will slowly begin to improve.  Please pray that his little lungs will respond well to these treatments.  Everything kind of centers around the lungs right now.  If they can improve, then other things may begin to follow.

The other main concern, as before, remains the potential for bleeding, so please continue to pray for that as well.  The longer Bennett remains on ECMO, the higher his chance for bleeding. 

Tomorrow morning at 9:23am our boy will be one week old.  And what a week it has been.  In fact, I'm not sure if he'll believe us when we tell him all that happened to him in his first week of life here on earth.  It has been a long and difficult week, but your prayers, pages, visits, emails, blogs, calls, and love have sustained us.  We cannot thank you enough for them. 

Today was our son's first Lord's Day, so we sang (most of your suggestions), read, and just talked about Jesus.  It was not how we pictured it, but it was oh so precious.  A memory we'll cherish forever, I'm sure. 

Tomorrow we begin week #2.  Please continue your loving prayers for our boy, for the wonderful medical staff at Georgetown, and for Kelly and I as we continue to adjust to life in the NICU. 

May God bless you all.  Have a great week.

Love,

Travis, Kelly, and Bennett

Bennett's status is unchanged for the most part.  He has "urinated" a bit more, so that's a great thing.  His lungs are still packed with an infection, but we know that it could be several days before that begins to come down.  Also, he showed some mild bloody discharge around one of the catheters in his neck, so they are watching that closely.  One of the main concerns (other than the infection) continues to remain the potential for bleeding, so please continue your prayers.

Kelly and I were blessed with a very good night's rest last night, and we feel refreshed and ready to start again.  Thank you all for your encouragement, your emails, your pages, your calls, your blog and guestbook entries, the sharing of your favorite Bible verses, and the sharing of your own NICU experiences.  They are all sustaining us.  May the Lord continue to bless you, our son, and may He continue to receive glory and honor. 

Also, please continue your prayers for Peter, Bennett's new neighbor who may have to go on ECMO.  I talked with his dad John (a DC police officer) yesterday in the waiting room, and shared with him that many of you were praying for his son as well.  I wish you could have seen the look on his face when I told him that.  He wanted me to tell you how grateful they are for those prayers for their family.

I will update more as soon as I have new information.  Have a wonderful weekend everyone.

Love,

Travis, Kelly, and Bennett

Well, overall, today has been a good day.  For the very first time we saw Bennett open his eyes a little!  It was awesome to see this, and it made our hearts leap with joy.  He was much more alert today, and it was such a good feeling to be next to our son and watch him try to make eye contact with us.  Such a small thing, but such a huge step.  It didn't last very long, but we loved every minute of it.  We were going to try and get a picture together with him with his eyes open, but he soon "pooped" in his pants (I just can't wait to see what kind of debate this sparks - let's see, should we use the word/phrase poop, or potty, #2?) and became extremely agitated when they changed his diaper.  As a result, his heartbeat jumped and the nurses suggested we give him a "visiting" break to reduce his stimulation and lower his heart rate.  So, we didn't spend a whole lot of time with him tonight, but the time that we did spend with him was precious.  His heartbeat overall remains strong, his blood pressure is good, and he is pooping and urinating much more now.  All of these are good signs. 

The 2 areas of most concern remain the same - the infection in the lungs, and the potential for bleeding.  Again, both of these issues are extremely serious and the staff continues to monitor him extremely close.  He has made some "progress," but we still have quite a ways to go.  Our little boy is hanging in there, and the nurses, doctors and staff at Georgetown continue to amaze us with their level of attention and care for our son.  I cannot thank them enough for all they do for him, day in and day out.  I'm an enormous Georgetown fan now, and I even bought (actually my dad bought it for me) my first "Hoya" t-shirt to prove it! 

During one of the times Bennett looked at me today, I think what he was trying to say was something like this:  "Dad, ok really, stop playing.  This is getting ridiculous and very old.  There is not one part of my body - not one part - that doesn't have something being inserted into it.  Would you like to try this?  I'd love to see you try.  I know you - you wouldn't make it 5 minutes in all this stuff!  Earlier in the week my body was 'frozen,' and 3 days later I was 'thawed' out.  That was real fun, too.  So, please, don't get on to me about being agitated when I poop and have to lift my legs to change my diaper.  Cut me some slack, please!"

Thank you all for your continued prayers, pages, emails, calls, letters, and love.  We are home now, and Kelly is resting as much as she can and is doing well overall.  Tomorrow is the Lord's day!  It will be Bennett's first, so do you have any suggestions as to what we should sing in the NICU tomorrow?  I've been looking around today, and I think the NICU has some great potential for some singers. 

Love,

Travis, Kelly, and Bennett  

I just got back from seeing Bennett, and he is doing about the same as last night.  This is a good thing.  Remember, we're just trying to keep him stable right now, and hoping that he doesn't digress any.  His heartbeat is good, his temperature is good, and his blood pressure is better.  AND, he urinated a bit more this morning (still not enough, but the Doctors are hopeful that he will urinate more as the hours go on).  I'm officially using the word "urinate" instead of pee now after a mild scolding from my mother!  It's amazing how long our conversation was about the use of the word urinate or pee.  I'm not really sure I see the difference.  Imagine this scene - my entire family is sitting in the NICU waiting room at Georgetown University Hospital talking about peeing and urination, and which one is better to use on the website.  We talked about this for like 30 minutes.  I'm not even kidding.  Anyway, I'm going to use the word urinate now, though I still like "the other" word better.  I think Bennett likes it better too. 

Another good sign is that he is starting to respond a bit more to talking and all the commotion around him.  He moves his eyelids and hands and feet more now, so that is such a blessing to see.  He has been pretty lifeless the last several days, so it's so good to see our son a little more active.

Please continue your prayers, and thank you from the bottom of our hearts for all the prayers and encouragement we've received already.  He's doing about as well as he can right now, considering all he's had to go through.  He's a little swollen because of all the fluids and just the shock of the procedure, but the Doctors say that this should come down in the next few days. 

I will post more once his chest x-rays and brain ultrasounds come back later this afternoon.

Love,

Travis, Kelly, and Bennett  

It seems that my last post about "urine" and "pee" kind of stirred the pot a little, and my family has been laughing at all the different opinions (and of course continuing to offer their own unsolicitated opinions) as to which one I should use.  I think I have more support for my word choice - I knew I was right!  And I think all this talk about urine has rubbed off on Bennett a little, because he has finally started to "urinate" a little more!!  Not a lot, but definitely more than before.  I never thought I would be so excited about someone "urinating!"   

Bennett, overall, has had a good day - praise God!  The attending Physicians said that the most recent EKG of his heart showed it to be in "great" condition.  This is the first time we've heard the word "great" in reference to our son's condition all week long, so I can't tell you how grateful we are to hear this.  His heartbeat is good, his blood pressure is good, and his most recent brain ultrasound showed no bleeding.  These are all very good updates in the right direction, so we are taking our first deep breath in quite some time.  Our boy is holding strong.

The 2 main concerns at this point are the potential for bleeding (because of the heparin in his system), and the infection in his lungs.  These are 2 very serious issues that I ask you to remain in prayer for.  The latest chest x-ray showed his lungs still full of an infection, so they continue to pump anitibiotics into his system in hopes of reducing the infection in his lungs over time.  There are other invasive ways to reduce the infection, but the Doctors don't want to attempt them unless there is no other alternative.  Please continue to pray that this infection would be reduced over time and for no bleeding to occur. 

Thank you again for all your prayers and comments.  I simply cannot express how grateful we are for your love and concern.  Although I want to respond to each guestbook entry, blog entry, call, and letter, at this point we simply cannot.  The NICU atmosphere (and I'm sure it's this way at any NICU), though amazingly impressive, is also extremely emotional and draining.  As time goes on and we understand more fully what to expect and what (if anything) we need, I can assure you I will let you know.  Until then, the things we need and love the most are your encouragement, your prayers, your pages, your calls, your letters, your gifts of season tickets to UT games through 2025, and your support.  Ok, ok, just kidding on the season ticket thing ;)

Also, Kelly is home now and doing well.  She needs a lot of rest, and we hope to be able to get a good night's rest tonight and begin fresh tomorrow.  Our ride home together this afternoon was a little more lonely than we expected it to be on our way to the hospital Monday morning, and it was even more difficult to come home and see everything waiting for Bennett.  But we look forward to the day when our boy can come home and enjoy our "little blue home" with us.       

May God continue to bless our precious son, and may He continue to receive the glory and honor due His name.  

Love,

Trav, Kell, and Bennett