Home Sweet Home II

Schweetie Pie, getting in her beauty rest on Mommy's bed.

We are so happy to be home!

After spending the last 4 days at the Children's Hospital at Montefiore, we were beyond elated to come home Wednesday evening. Anna was so excited to be back in her bed, and Daddy and Mommy did a great job hooking her up to the Kangaroo (the pump that feeds her overnight through the tube) so she could get most of all her hydration and nutrition while she slept. We underwent training in the hospital to learn all of the equipment and I know it will get easier and easier as time goes on. Right now, I have a mental checklist that I triple-check but I can see how it will become second nature soon.

After a relaxing sponge bath last night, she fell asleep around 10 o'clock (after yelling for us to come pick her up for about an hour until Daddy, for the fourth time, went in and said sternly "It's night night Anna!") She finally went down and slept through until 6 a.m. when we heard her getting restless. We gave her some more pain medication and water, changed her diaper and onesie, and laid her back down. Around 8:30 I heard her breathing a little funny and went in to check on her. She was having a sleep apnea episode so I brought her in to our bed and she slept soundly with me until I couldn't sleep anymore (what a gift!) and I made myself some coffee and waited for her to wake up, which she did around 11.

We had breakfast, her favorite meal!, with baby oatmeal mixed with melted butter, warmed milk, honey, and some pureed prunes on the side (all by mouth), then gave her water and vitamins (through the tube). I feel like our decision to get this tube is paying off already, because we've had more wet (a.k.a. hydrated!) diapers in the last 3 days then we've had in 6 weeks! She's also able to get her vitamin supplements that we haven't been able to give since she was about 10 months, when all of her feeding difficulties really began. I guess you could say we are doing - and feeling - okay.

She just laid down again, and I am foreseeing this little schedule of hers to continue through the day. Eat, sleep, up; eat sleep, up; eat sleep up. Not bad.

:)

She is in such a wonderful mood today, smiling and happy, and recuperating just fine. The house is quiet though, which is taking some getting used to... Abuela, Amonica (as Gabe calls her - "Aunt" plus "Monica" equals "Amonica", which I guess is an improvement from when he was 3 and called her "Monka"), and Rafi left for Florida early this morning and we miss them already. Gabe is also gone, visiting his friend Philip in Brooklyn where he had a sleepover there last night and I'll be picking him up later this afternoon. I miss that boy a lot, but I also know I am going to have a hundred questions when he sees Anna with her new addition, which isn't exactly "bling."

We prepared him as well as we could, explaining to him on Sunday before we left for the hospital that Anna was going to get a button on her belly to help us feed her and so she could get more water in her belly since it was hard for her to drink it. I figured if I put it in "Gabe terms" it'd be much easier to understand. This is, of course, a 5-year old who reports to me after each bathroom break how "yellow my pee is" because he knows the more yellow it is, the more he needs to drink water, "so my pee is clear. The clearer the better, Mom" he tells me.

So I figure all we need to mention is how clear Anna's pee is going to be and he'll be fine! I am also going to show him how he can help me, if he wants to, and just be a part of it all.

I hear Anna stirring in the other room, so I have to end this rather quickly. Thank you to everyone who prayed for us the last few days. We feel them and see them at work.