Introducing Table for Five: A Father's Story of Life, Love, and Loss

Ted has written a book about the journey of our triplets!

Available on Amazon

More info on the website: pedihelp.com

4 Years Old - Moving On

We had a small group of friends over for the kids' fourth birthday party yesterday. It's hard to imagine that 4 years ago our lives changed forever. This was Sofia's long awaited trach-free birthday and she celebrated it with her friend Kai-Lan! And by running around the house with Daniel! Both kids are fully recovered from their road trip and are loving being back at school. As are their parents. This week we will have a small memorial for Raymond by planting another plant in his memory. And we thought that this is an appropriate time for us to "close" the blog. There are still many challenges ahead: getting Sofia off her feeding tube and eating solid food, getting her talking, Daniel improving his social and verbal skills, and all of the regular things 4 year olds need! But the big, crazy challenge of keeping Sofia alive these past four years has been accomplished thanks to help from our family, friends, doctors, nurses, neighbors and of course support from our blog readers. The adventure will continue on, so if you haven't already please friend mommy at Christine Maltese Yang on Facebook, for the ongoing saga of the Yang triplets. Ted + Christine

Back from our huge roadtrip!

We just got back from our 1.5 wk roadtrip to Denver for Uncle Tim's wedding. Sofia wasn't quite ready to fly yet so we piled in the car for a drive across most of the country. A good thing too as when the altitude went up her sats dropped and the first night out there was a bit tough. We stopped at plenty of friends along the way and had lots of adventures. Here are some random pics from the trip, more to come later:

And a video of Daniel dancing (?) with a street violinist in Boulder:

Still sick

Sofia is recovering but is still coughing a lot, so we will be taking her to chop next monday to see their pulmonology unit as well as have her altitude tested to see if she is ready for her trip to Denver. Daniel is mostly recovered and both kids are a lot happier overall!

Sick little girl

Sofia has had some kind of bug for the past few days and so did Daniel.  To help her get better she is getting nebulizer treatments as well as her vest treatment which loosens up her mucus and secretions.  Now that she is trach-free, she can't just be suctioned to remove them!

On her own

CHOP has basically declared victory on her airway. Her next scope won't be until the fall. This is great news but of course it means that Sofia won't have as much nursing. Right now we still have nursing in the night because of all of the feeding issues and monitoring needed, especially so close to her surgery to prevent any reflux or other issues. So Sofia had to go to school today on her own and have class without a nurse following her around. Of course Daniel as there to help out. Sort of. She did great!

First Sail and Update

For the 4th we were lucky enough to take the family on a friend's boat to sail around the sound a bit. Just for the afternoon. Both kids really enjoyed it although Sofia was antsy at first. Daniel was really good throughout. However after stopping for lunch, both kids promptly passed out on the way back! Sorry no pictures, we'll take some next time! Sofia had a swallow test with her feeding therapist, her first since her last surgery. She did pretty well although is out of practice. We're speaking now to CHOP to see how they want to proceed but the results were encouraging.

Patriotic kids

The kids are all ready for the 4th!

Unfortunately Sofia fell off the couch yesterday and had to get a stitch. She was jealous anyways of Daniel's special trip and was missing her friends at the hospital.  She wouldn't sit still for more than one stitch even with three people holding her down.  She's fine now so one was enough!