It is hard to believe, but it’s true, Erin has been in the hospital for 25 days straight; even harder to believe is it’s been 20 days already since Erin’s transplant! We were scheduled to go home yesterday, but Erin began complaining of shortness of breath. This led to a chest X-ray and confirmation that Erin had fluid around her right lung called a pleural effusion. When she had her last chest tube removed she still had a significant amount of drainage. They tried treating this with a diuretic, but that caused her kidney numbers to rise, so they discontinued them. They are using the diuretics again to try and absorb the fluid buildup because it is the least evasive procedure. They will continue to monitor her kidneys and evaluate her progress with daily chest X-rays. If the fluid doesn’t improve they will insert a catheter to drain the fluid. The extra fluid is causing some pain and making her physical therapy a little more difficult. The diuretics also tend to mess with her blood sugars which we were finally getting under control. Her appetite and fluid intake improved today, but her energy level remained low. The weather has been beautiful here this week and she has made several walks to the roof top garden, enjoying some time outside of her hospital room.