Lucas Camilo

Other than playing with Lucas (now that he’s awake so often) and holding him, perhaps our most frequent interaction with the little guy involves suctioning.   That’s right, suctioning.  As we’ve mentioned before, he doesn’t swallow a lot and at the same time manages to generate copious amounts of mucus in his throat, a rough combination.   The saliva and mucus build up and ultimately we have to use an electronic suction device, sometimes as often as every few hours, to clean him up.  He’s gotten better at coughing up the mucus on his own, especially when rolled onto his side, but he still needs the suctioning to keep from drowning (and, we should mention that lately the nurses have been impressed with our deft ability to pull big mucus plugs out of the corners of his mouth.)  We also occasionally suction down his trach with a sterile catheter to get the secretions that have built up lower down in his trachea and lungs, but its nothing like what comes out of his nose and mouth.

Today Lucas is especially full of boogies and it may be because he has a little cold.   It doesn’t seem to be phasing him since he continues to wiggle and stare at us with wide eyes while putting his hand up to his face and rubbing the saliva all around.  Mmmmmm.  We found the perfect song for him on a CD given to us by our friends Andy and Susan in New York.  It’s called “Boogers” and is written and performed by the activist/folk singer David Rovics.
[audio:Boogers.mp3]