Moved out of Intensive Care!

Audrey has been moved out of intensive care!

This corner of Audrey's hospital room is where I will sleep for the next month until she is discharged.  It is a shared room with one other family.  After five months in the NICU last year where I couldn't stay overnight with her at all, this might as well be the penthouse suite. I am so relieved to be able to stay right with her and be there to help or comfort with everything that she needs to have done to her, it doesn't matter how much space or comfort I have. The time will seem shorter because we're together. I don't count days because things often happen to extend or shorten people's stays, so for me just taking each day at a time is the best way to manage. But if I ever need a break, the art museum is a couple of blocks away, as are the trains to countless lovely things. Though if my prior experiences are any insight, I think we may even be seeing a very quick discharge at this rate. Time will tell.

She loves her new Boston duck that we got for her while she was paralyzed, and the kitty she borrowed from her 9-year-old big brother (who was happy to share and very sweet about it) as we were heading to Boston.

What a big day. Audrey gave us her first smiles since before surgery! Her personality is definitely starting to come back, though her vocal chords are still swollen from the breathing tube and she doesn't want to open her mouth because they had to suction her lungs a lot yesterday. She is very suspicious of the nurses now, but they have been stellar. She got her arterial line out today, and arm braces off (so she can move her arms freely again, yay!), and tomorrow hopefully her chest tube can come out! Yesterday it was clogged, so they had to do some yucky painful work on her to get it moving again, so she has to put up with it one more day, but once that's done she'll probably be able to get off her narcotics. Yesterday they also discontinued her IV painkillers so it's just as needed now, but the chest tube means she still needs morphine fairly regularly until that's gone. Enjoyed my last day with my husband here. She and I are both going to miss him a lot! Tomorrow he heads to the airport and I will officially move into the hospital room with Audrey. I have loved staying at the hospital family housing. What a wonderful place, very much like the smaller Ronald McDonald house I stayed at last summer for six weeks-- the residents become like family to one another. If only my whole family could be allowed to be here, but sadly we are too many to fit their rules! It's nice to know though, that the hospital is working on finding a way to accommodate larger families like ours in this sort of situation. I take back any angry and frustrated vents I may have earlier had about discrimination against large families. By far the majority of people have been amazed and just impressed, positively, about my family size. There is a really supportive and generous atmosphere here in Boston toward parents and children, and there are tons of family-friendly free activities in the city.