My Beatiful Son Zachary Cole Ficco

I have never felt so helpless in my life...My Valiant son gave up his fight on Thanksgiving morning at 0950. I am so proud of you son you fought like a knight before you rode off on your white horse. You are the most beautiful soul I have ever known. You have inspired me more times than I can count. We are mirror images of each other. I did not realize just how much a part of me you are until 0950 when a very large part of me died with you. You have looked over me trying to rally my strength to keep surviving. I have barley been able to leave my bed. I can't sleep I have nightmares, I don't want to be awake because my mind is crazy right now. I have found it difficult to talk, to blog, to breath, to think I might make it another minute. I know you are giving me time to grieve and you will pick me up and carry me through this horrific pain until I see the light, you will lead me to the reason for this chapter in our book. I want you to know how incredibly strong your brothers and sister and your dad have been for me. I whispered in your ear before your passing that I would take care of everybody for you not to worry and in fact they are all taking care of me. It is the inspirational words of your brothers and sister that help me take one minute at a time until I can do one hour at a time then one day, then one month. You rest in peace my beautiful son and know that I will always hold you in my heart, my thoughts and my memories. I will make good on my promise to keep your name alive and I will make it to the top of all the 14er's in Colorado as you inspired to do in your lifetime as we talked about at my birthday lunch. We thought you had many years to accomplish your goal. I love you my baby boy...my son who grew into a wonderful man. My heart explodes with pride for all you accomplished in your short life. Your story will not end here, I promise this to you. I love you with all of my heart...sleep tight. Your very proud mom.

Wednesday November 26th

Well I woke up...yes Idid catch a wink or two to hear that the WBC's increased again today from yesterdays count of 3. something to 5.7 yeah WBC's The oncologists actually look at the blood smear himself today to make sure he did not see any blast cells on the slide and he did not. This is promising news and it sounds like the chemo may be doing some good. Now the discouraging news is that Zach is and has been in complete organ failure. This is the reason for dialysis, the vent etc. The hope has been that these things will begin to work on their own with time. Today the labs showed an increase in some numbers that are concerning. His lactate is now elevated and bilirubin continues to be high >50, his Blood gases still are showing a pretty serious acidosis which is not reversing even with bicarb, his other LFT's (liver function tests) are in the normal range including the INR. Zach's blood pressure continues to fluctuate up and down dependant upon movement and whatever. It is really unclear as to why this is happening. He continues to be up 23 liters of fluid. We started to remove fluid again today which put him back on vasopressers. The fluid had to stop being removed at about a liter. I really am hoping to get some of this fluid off, it can't be doing any good. When we started removing fluid last time is when Zach's ability to get off the osc. vent happened. They started trickle feeding him again today with the hopes that we can get his gut moving again. This come with some infection risk giving the bacteria the medium to thrive and the concern for stirring up his gallbladder again, so a little scary but necessary to make headway. He is down to 50% on the vent and now we hope to be able to wean the nitric oxide off slowly without losing lung recruitment. This is where all of the extra fluid plays in, in my opinion. If we could get some more fluid off I am sure it could help in so many ways.

So here is what we need. Now everyone was praying for WBC's as I asked you to do and we rallied them. So we need to pray for organ function Lungs, Kidneys, and Liver. We also need a hct and platelet counts to stabilize So pray for these huge things I know we can make this happen with the power of prayer. Let's go Team Zach.

Okay so Zach would be telling what a dork I am by saying "Team Zach", so I am laughing right now because I have probably embarrassed him.....but this is why he loves me so much and me him. (he he)

Ronda

Funny Story

Okay so Zach has been trying to be more mechanically inclined and work on his truck when things go wrong or it needs maintenance. It is time for a brake change and he is shown how to put on new brakes and was left to complete the other three sides. He proceeds on to complete the job and didn't do a bad job. He puts the wheels back on the car and is going to take it for a spin to check out the new brakes and next thing he notices is the front tire rolling away from the truck in front of him as he is driving down the road. He of course tries to keep this top secret from his dad and calls his grandpa who helps him get the situation under control. We laughed and teased him until our stomachs hurt. He may or may not of told anybody this story so as to not get teased anymore but it is out there now for others to get a good laugh. The funny thing is once his dad found out, he told a story of when he had done the exact same thing when he was younger and Zach didn't feel so bad.

I love this kid so much and he has always given us reasons to laugh. He just cracks me sometimes he has to do everything his way and most of the time it is the hard way but is has always been interesting and sometime humerus to watch him succeed. He has so much to offer this world and his mission is not yet complete. I love you Zachary Cole. Keep fighting you will come out on top.

Ronda

All of My Wonderful Children

So I wanted to share another photo of all of my children. This was taken at a Young Marine event in which my other boys including my nephew and of course Zach's siter is in the picture too.. Zach was at this event and trying to get all of the kids not to act like goofballs and take a good picture is always a task in itself. They all look so handsome and sissy is pretty cute too.

Tuesday November 25th Morning

Good Morning. I did not sleep much last night as you can see by my all night blogging. Zach did fairly well last night until this morning when x-ray came in to do his chest films. His b/p was borderline low for him and the movement caused his b/p to drop tremendously again. He does not like x-ray in the morning. We have a "new nurse" today which always brings uncertainties for me. He is so particular and any little thing and certain little things throw him off balance. It is so frustrating. He was off pressers since early last night and a simple x-ray caused his b/p to drop to 80/39. I want his Mean to stay above 60 without a doubt because his blood o2 levels are not in the 90's since his incident a couple days ago. I want to have complete success with his recovery and most importantly his brain and organ function. I will spend the day keeping a close eye on everything. As I mentioned before the nurses here are wonderful but he does not function as a nurse would anticipate, he likes to throw twists and turns at you. He is unpredictably- predictable. So When I know more on labs and what the Dr's have to say I will let you know. Have a great day everyone!

Ronda

My Family at " The Burb"

So as you can see it is my night to show appreciation and to give thanks. With Thanksgiving around the corner I have been sitting here thinking of the many things I have to be thankful for this holiday season. Although my holiday will not be quite the same this year it is certainly one in which I have so many things to be thankful for. To all of my friends from work, Thank you all for your continued blogging, phone calls and support. I can't say I have thought much about work over the last three weeks but I have certainly thought about each of you and the love, prayers, support, delicious meals and religious blogging. This blog keeps me connected to the outside world and gives me an outlet from this madness. The words are inspirational and the love is heartfelt. Thank you all and I do miss you guys. I hope to have Zach well in time and I will be back trying to make a difference.

Much love to each of you,

Ronda

Thank You Good Sam's Staff

So last but not least I want to just put it out there....the staff at Good Sams is beyond amazing. So this is kinda funny I shared with you I think in another blog post that We had decided to move Zach to University this was a couple weeks ago. My concern was Zach's liver failing and the possible need for a transplant I wanted him to be where this could happen if necessary. So I requested the transfer. The nurses worked diligently getting all of the transfer papers ready and Airlife's helicopter was dispatched. As I hear the copter landing on the helipad outside Zach's window I whispered in his ear the flight crew was here to pick him up. (Now for many of you, you probably don't know this about me I have always had the desire to be a flight nurse.) So I proceeded to tell Zach How jealous I was that he was going to get to fly before me. So as they were landing and proceeding up to the second floor Zach decides to become too unstable to leave or might I say fly before me. I was laughing about this on the inside, when I realized that maybe he realized that the care he would receive here would be more than anyone could ask for. I cannot say enough nice things about the staff at this hospital. Dr. Kinnard whom I dearly love and respect and his entire team of Doctors from every sub-specialty you can imagine has Zach's best interest at heart, we appreciate each of you. The nurses each of them take very special care of Zach and We love them all. There are a handful of nurses that routinely care for him and have come to know him very well, his likes and dislikes to Heather, Leslie, Kim, Carrie, Kathy and David thank you for the love and care you exhibit for my son day after day and night after night. I thank each of the other nurses that see him in between we appreciate and love you as well. Respiratory you guys all are wonderful and keep the airway rolling. To our regulars Marty, Eric, Kelly and Sherry and to all of the others in between thank you. Sara in EVS you are very compassionate and we thank you. You will make a great nurse someday! To Amy and Liz thank you for the support when things get tough helping when a crisis arises and all the hugs.

I cannot wait for each of you to meet my son. He is an amazing man full of life, love and kindness. You will love him as all the ones who know him do. Thank you all!

Ronda