Update on Papa

Well, God had a change of plans! We got a call about 4:15 this morning that Papa had taken a turn for the worse - wasn't breathing and they were about to put him on the ventilator. I jumped up and flew to the hospital. Lee stayed home with Caitlin. I got to his room and he was still there. They had him intubated (breathing tube down his throat) and he had just had an x-ray. There were lots of people there as they had called a "Code Blue" which is either cardiac or respiratory arrest. The doctor and nurses were there, the chaplain, two security guards, and the nursing house supervisor. They moved him back down to CICU and put him on the ventilator. It was a difficult morning to say the least. Papa was not responding or breathing on his own at all. His vital signs were stable though. We called lots of people trying to get the word out for people to pray for him. I told Lee that it would take a miracle for him to pull through. We did a lot of talking among ourselves about important issues. There was a lot of crying too, for we love our Papa! About lunch time, they turned down the settings on the ventilator as Dr. Kim wanted him off of it as quick as possible so his body wouldn't become dependent on it to breathe. He started opening his eyes a little and trying to pull at the breathing tube. As the afternoon wore on, he would mouthe some words like "please" when he would hit at the tube (we explained that it would have to stay and it couldn't come out yet) and "move" when he wanted the head of his bed up or down. We were thrilled to see this! The respiratory therapist said that he is initiating all of his breaths. This mean that he breathes often, but not very deep. The machine just enhances each breath that he takes. They are going to leave him on the machine until in the morning and then see if they can get him off of it. He's running a temp of 102 and is getting some Tylenol for this. The doctor seems to think that he may have aspirated (choked on / inhaled) some of his secretions (saliva) into his lungs that caused pneumonia. He's on antibiotics for this. Words cannot describe the sense of relief we had this afternoon and I believe that we truly witnessed a miracle. God is faithful and His timing is perfect. I'm not trying to jump ahead and I know we have a long road ahead of us, but things looked so bleak this morning. As of now (7:51pm) we have all left the hospital. It's important that we all get some rest and that's near impossible at the hospital. I ask that you pray for Papa and for our family. I will update again tomorrow hopefully.