The Dreaded Button

Back in January we came home from dinner at the inlaws to find that Aidan lost his feeding tube. For those of you that do not know what this is, Aidan has a small tube called a button that was surgically implanted into his stomach. Its held in place by an inflated balloon filled with water. It allows us to give him medication and supplemental food as his body does not process calories the same way everyone else does. Most people and kids his age put on pounds and he puts on grams or ounces.

Lisa got one of our neighbors who has a child with a feeding tube in to help us try and re-insert a new one. Needless to say, it didn't work. The hole started to close up. She drove to jersey shore and spent 3 hours or so there on a sunday night to find that they could not get a tube back in. Monday morning she drove to Children's Hospital of Philadelphia and spent all day there while they used different size tubes to expand his opening until they were able to restore the right size.

On this past Saturday Aidan was being a typical boy wrestling, jumping and doing what boys do when again, the tube came out. The panic set in. Lisa ran and got a new tube and tried to re-insert it before the hole started to close up. Aidan was not having this at all. He fought and fought this until finally it took myself and Justin holding him down so Lisa could fit the tube back in and inflate it. Crisis averted thanks to a somewhat calm wife who held it together while probably being freaked out at having to do this for the first time.