We continue to wait patiently and pray the Lord to strengthen Martin's heart, lungs, and entire body. We have so much to be thankful for. A baby beside us (Jackson) also has HLHS, but with severe complications. In fact, while we were here bedside with Martin late last night, they rushed us out quite suddenly because Jackson took a bad turn and they needed to work on him. We learned this morning from his dad that he is in emergency open-heart surgery again. They have already been here for over 2 months and anticipate having to stay in Charleston until Jackson's second scheduled surgery when he is 6 months old (they are from Greenville as well). It is heartbreaking to witness another family suffering and I'm sure they are very weary and discouraged. We told them that we have been praying for them as well.

We are so thankful that the Lord has (thus far) spared Martin and he is stable and recovering. Thank you for remembering us and especially Martin.

Update 11:30am: They brought the ventilator support down to 70% and are continuing to monitor his numbers and fluids -- oxygen level seems a bit on the low side. The respiratory specialist just informed us that although all of this is good progress, eventually when they close his chest in a day or so they may need to put him back on everything again (nitric oxide, 100% ventilator, epinephrine, dopamine, etc). But we'll cross that bridge when we get to it. One baby step at a time.

Update 2:00pm -- big step! They have taken him off the paralytic medicine completely. This is the medicine used to keep him "paralyzed" so he doesn't move a muscle. Any minute now he should be making movements ("twitches" they said) and he may even open his eyes by evening! They are doing this in hopes that he will begin breathing on his own more and more. My guess is that if he sees us, it may boost his heartrate and generally get him closer to recovery. I can't wait to see his eyes open! We will be here all day to wait for him to "wake up."

Update 6:15pm -- doctor's report. Dr. Kavarana (the surgeon) was just here. He said Martin could not be better! He said he was really worried about him the night after surgery, but he has really turned around and proved to be a very strong boy. He says if things continue to improve like this, he may close Martin's chest tomorrow morning between 8am and 9am. Martin is still sleeping and showing no signs of waking up yet. They said he would start to take breaths on his own before making any kind of movement, and he hasn't done that yet. It'll just take some time.