All Hooked Up

Last weekend, one of our friends, Nikole, was over at the house. She was there early enough that Eli was still asleep and hooked up to his feeding tube. As Eli woke up and Adam began to un-hook him from his pump, Nikole walked into the bedroom where Eli was. She watched Adam un-hook Eli, then she came to me, somewhat in shock, and said she had no idea that that is what we meant by saying Eli was "hooked up". She suggested that I write a blog with pictures about what "hooked up" really means. In thinking about it, I realized, "Well, before Eli, I didn't know what any of this looked like, so how would anyone else know?" So.... here is what is involved in getting Eli hooked up at night and ready for bed!

This is the formula and medication that goes into Eli's tube every night. The PediaSure 1.5 has 350 calories per can. The white packet is a laxative. Since Eli's diet is about 90% dairy, it really does a number on his stomach; the laxative makes it a bit easier on him. The bottle and syringe is an antibiotic. Eli's not always on this, but he's on some sort of antibiotic more often than not. For now, he's on a 14-day round, 3 times a day, of this antibiotic. Unless it is red, Eli won't usually even try to take medicine orally. So we usually just put it through his tube.

This is the bag that the formula and laxative or poured into. The tube from the bag is then run through the pump. We prime the formula through the tube so no air is in it, then set it to run. At the time, Eli receives 43 CCs an hour for 10 hours for a total of 430 CCs a night.

This is the connector that plugs into Eli's port. You have to apply a little bit of pressure, but it snaps into Eli's button, then twists to lock.

These are two pictures of Eli's button: one with it closed and one with it open, ready to be connected.



This is the tube hooked into Eli's button.

Then, we put the antibiotic in through the side-port on Eli's tube.

Then, Eli's all hooked up and ready to go to bed. The pump will run for 10 continuous hours throughout the night. We have to be sure to put another round of antibiotics in the tube before it is done so it will have plenty of time to run through. This is a picture of him about to fall asleep, all hooked up, and snuggling with his special Tubie Friend.

And finally, this is how we give him meds mid-day. Since his antibiotic that he is currently on needs to be taken 3 times a day, we give it at night, in the morning, then half way through the day. We hook Eli up to a shorter tube, prime it with purified water, put a syringe of water on top and put the medicine syringe through the side port. We push in the antibiotic, then let the water run through to flush all the medicine in. The worst part of doing this is that you often risk Eli coughing. If he coughs while the tube is hooked up, then everything in his stomach (formula, medicine, milk, yogurt, juice, or whatever it may be) comes back up, through the tube, and into the big syringe. No only is this disgusting, but it is also not healthy because it can lead to infection or the tube being clogged. So you cross your fingers, hoping this doesn't happen, but it has already happened to me 3 time in the past week.

So, there it is: The process of getting Eli all hooked up at night! It's a long process, but it's what keeps him healthy!