Amazing Doctors, Big Dogs, Good Drugs and a Wonderful Husband

Thursday they found yeast growing in John's central line culture, thankfully it wasn't in the peripheral culture also but still this meant that his central line had to come out NOW! Amazingly enough John didn't and doesn't appear the least bit septic and the only ill effects are in dealing with trying to push his feeds and cut his IV fluids so that he doesn't have to have a central line put back in.

Of course all this meant that John would need to remain in the hospital until Monday at least and I had a Friday appointment to have my wisdom teeth taken out. Trying to figure out how to be in two places at one time was making us crazy. We never leave John alone in the hospital for any length of time at all. The staff is wonderful and we trust them implicitly but they are also busy and have more children to be responsible for than just ours. We have seen families in various stages of meltdown when their kids are ill and it only takes moments to steal a child's life, health or innocence, call us over-protective, we'll wear that label with pride.

Our dilemma was brought to an end by the kindness of Dr. Wheeler - the resident in charge of John's case. He came the morning of my oral surgery to give me his personal assurance that he would make sure that John wouldn't be alone at all while we were gone. We don't know the names of everyone who stayed with John, we do know that another resident stayed with him at first and then Dr. Wheeler sat with him personally for a while. We hear the nurses and staff talk back and forth about how impressed they are with Dr. Wheeler, no one is more impressed or more thankful than John's mom and dad.

I must admit that I don't remember a lot about Friday morning. Going to the appointment is clear but from the time the IV went in until sometime Friday afternoon is pretty much lost in a haze of hydrocodone. Friday afternoon though we had a visit from Teddy, a Newfoundland who comes to visit the kids in the hospital. John was amazed to see such a huge dog, he petted him a bit and then when Teddy laid down on the floor John liked to sit by him. I think the dog visit did as much good for me as for John. I had forgotten how silky soft their fur is and how big a presence they are in a room.

Tonight Mark was able to go back home to get some rest before worship in the morning. The pain has subsided to the point that 1/2 a hydrocodone every 6 to 8 hours is fine and on that amount I am lucid enough to care for John. It's funny I can see that my face is swelling a bit, but it really just looks like me 20 pounds ago, I'm surely thankful that the rest of me isn't swelling to match my face.

Mark is nearly home now, and as much as he'd like to be here with us he's needed there too. Friday as I drifted in and out of the haze it was so comforting to have him here. I didn't always know exactly what they were up to but I could hear that both Mark and John were enjoying their time together and if John remembers much from this hospitalization it will be good memories of his daddy who loves him so much.