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| Loving |
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| Days after transplant! First smiles! |
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| Hours before they took him down for his transplant |
The first month after transplant went incredibly smooth until his 1 month biopsy and cath. We quickly found out that Roman had level 3a rejection which is pretty serious. However, after some heavy IV steroids, a month later Roman's rejection level as remained ZERO!!
Roman was finally discharged from the hospital just in time to spend his first Father's day at home. However the stay was shortened by a tummy virus and we headed back to "the slammer" for a 4 night stay.
The summer remained a blur as we were going to clinic weekly, started intense physical therapy, occupational/feeding therapy, early intervention, etc. Roman quickly realized his love for food and by late August we were able to remove his feeding tube once and for all! Roman was also reaching his pt goals and was finally sitting up by himself, which lead to crawling, which lead us to walking! Roman also started making his first sounds and found a great interest in sign language.
As we entered cold and flu season, we sheltered ourselves in making sure we kept Roman as healthy as we could. Unfortunately, the Noro Virus plagued our household and Roman took it very hard. We spent 4 weeks off and on in "the slammer" trying to get him back to his normal. Roman received the first ever, for a transplant patient, oral antibodies to help his body fight the virus. After loosing 2 pounds and making food changes we were finally over it after 2 1/2 months!!
Roman also had a number of follow up appointments, to make sure his vision and hearing was ok since he suffered a lot of traumatic events in his short little life. We found out in December that he had mild hearing loss, and unfortunately had developed cataracts in both eyes as a result of the meds he was taking for his heart. By March, we saw a decrease of activities that Roman had been able to accomplish and we knew his eyes were getting worse. At his March appointment the doctor informed us that his vision was almost gone because the cataracts had gotten worse. Surgery was set in three weeks. Roman handled his surgery like the champ that he is! As so as his eye patches came off, we were able to tell a night and day difference! It is incredible!
Roman also took his first airplane ride to Tennessee! He loved every minute of it! He has also enjoyed many trips to the zoo, and the park.
On May 14th we will hand our little man back over to his trusting cath team. We ask that you join us in prayer that he has zero rejection and that he continues to stay healthy! We can not express how thankful we are to have so many supporters and prayer warriors for our little man!
