3/22

Things continue to ... change. Yesterday John was off medication to keep his blood pressure up; he was changed from continuous dialysis to intermittent dialysis; and, the nurses were able to draw off some of the extra fluid causing his edema. Every one of these steps can cause blood pressure to drop so John's ability to tolerate them and maintain his own pressure was a major step forward. It all caught up with him later; his pressure did crash; and his heart beat went dangerously high last night and again this morning. The docs were able to control it with meds and he will go back on continuous dialysis sometime tonight but it is a step backward. His pneumonia is unchanged; his fusarium is resistant to the med he has been receiving so another antifungal has been added. He is having low grade temps so all of his antibiotics have been restarted. Some good news is that his cytomegalovirus numbers are down from 5000 to 1000; normal is about 100 but that is still a great improvement. Without the sedation, he is opening his eyes a lot and is able to focus but is not able to communicate. I am telling him about all of you but mostly am encouraging him to rest and gather his strength. He has a lot of challenges ahead.