Layla is pretty well ready to leave the hospital – that’s my unprofessional opinion. Today she was excited, rambunctious, playful, laughing – everything you’d expect a happy, healthy two year old to be. In any other setting, it’d be normal. In the hospital, not so much. I feel like a kid waiting for Christmas — just 2 more sleeps, 1 more day. But who’s counting?
Monthly Archive for January, 2010
The planned discharge day of Sunday was moved back to at least Monday. The doctor is being extra cautious with Layla – she continues to cough (a couple times a day) despite the medicine, so the doctor doesn’t want to take any chances of her having any kind of relapse. I guess I should appreciate the doctor’s extra care but I can’t help but feel she’s been overly cautious. For the last few days, Layla has been very energetic, playful, cheerful, etc. I understand there’s still a bit of a rattle in her chest and the ever-present cough, but I’m confident Layla’s body can fight off whatever it is that’s left over in her system. She’s had worse without even a trip to the doctor, let alone a stay in the hospital. On the flipside, I guess it’s better to be have an extra day of caution than to release her early and have another week in the hospital because she has another attack… regardless, it sucks to hear the doctor tell you it’s going to be even longer than anticipated…. originally it was only supposed to be a week-long stay. They say all good things come to those who wait – I feel like the amount of time we’ve waited, we deserve the best thing… and, all things going well, Monday we will get the best thing, and her name is Layla.
I was planning on being in the office by 7am to allow for an early departure so that I might spend some time at the hospital with Layla. Unfortunately, that was not to be…
I woke up this morning with a kick in the back as Tamie did her best to shake me from what I can only imagine was a delightful dream. The 5am alarm that I so meticulously set the night before somehow didn’t go off, and the 7am angry wife had to suffice. It more than did the job.
I ended up at the office just before 9am, but surprisingly still the first one in. A full day’s work was done, in fact it came down to the wire on the last task I was working on. I left at 16:15, hopeful that the work I just finished was done correctly but torn between wishing I had more time to check it and wishing I’d left an hour earlier to get to the hospital. As it was, I still made it a few minutes before 18:00.
When I got to the hospital, I was shocked to find another kid in Layla’s bed. She’d been shifted one bed over, for not other reason than the fact that the room was packed. 8 beds, 8 kids in various states, between hysterically crying for their parents to quietly playing to sleeping. Fun times, indeed. Layla was sitting on Tamie, clutching her like she was trying to fall asleep… turns out she was just starving.
Dinner eventually came and Layla scarfed down her rice and soup. I helped as best I could, but she was so eager to eat that silly things like using a spoon properly wasn’t going to stop her from getting the food into her mouth. She managed to feed herself, and the table and the bed, with little problem.
Thankfully, her energy is up as much as her spirits seem to be – she wanted to play for almost the entire time I was there. The only time she didn’t was when she got made at me for having to hold her and give her medicine instead of letting her play longer.
Layla’s bad mood didn’t last long though — one of the other inmates that Layla has taken a liking to, a young guy (one month Layla’s junior) named yuma-kun, was sitting watching tv and falling asleep. His head was bobbing but he was doing a good job of catching himself before he fell over. No one else seemed to notice (or care) so Tamie eventually went over to see if he wanted to sleep. Instead, he wanted to play and I reorganized a few machines to give Layla enough slack on her leashes so she could reach too. We played with the kid for a good 45 minutes before lights out and everyone had to go to bed.
By 21:00, Layla was still full of energy. Tamie had laid down with her to try to get her to sleep but even after an hour of trying Layla was still wide awake. At one point they were whispering and giggling together like school girls – it was so cute. When the nurse finally came to say visiting hours were done, Layla didn’t cry, accepting it like the hospital veteran she is.
Layla is still coughing a bit today, but overall is definitely much better than she was a week (or even two days) ago. After talking to the doctor, the prognosis is definitely good and it seems like Sunday is the discharge day, given all things progress as expected. I am so looking forward to the day we take her home. Not as much as she is, I’m sure, but things are so much better when she’s around.
Tomorrow is my day alone at the hospital while Tamie goes to work. Here’s hoping it’s my last.
Today was my day to visit Layla at the hospital. Tamie got up and left early for work, and I got up and worked a couple hours remotely before heading to the hospital. In both cases, I’m sure we’d both rather get up at an almost reasonable hour, fight with Layla to wake up, eat her breakfast, get dressed and go to daycare. Ask me again in a week…
I got the hospital just as Layla was finishing her lunch. Two things struck me when I came in. Firstly, she was sitting at a small table with a fellow inmate, a girl a bit older than Layla who had been there a couple days already. Second, she was free of one of the leashes that kept her stuck to her bed. The tube feeding her oxygen was no longer wrapped around her head poking into her nose. I am sure the moment they took that leash off she savoured the sweet, non-oxygen-enriched smell of the dank air in the hospital.
Layla seemed pretty happy, eating everything that was in front of her but the poor other kid just sat and stared at us. A nurse tried to get her to eat, but she refused. As I helped Layla eat, I tried to get her to eat too but she just stared blankly at me. I guess hunger finally convinced her to eat because eventually she started wolfing down everything on her tray. Bedside manner at its finest.
After lunch, Layla wanted to colour so I got her markers and her colouring book out of the desk beside the bed. She took them over to the small table, where the fellow inmate was also preparing to do some drawing. I was happy to see that, finally, Layla had someone closer to her age to interact with. I wish I could say they got along well, but at least they were social to each other. They shared crayons, markers and paper but beyond that it was every inmate for themselves.
While the colouring was going on, the new batch of co-op students showed up. Tamie had signed a permission form allowing said students to use Layla as a training ground for their future careers. I thought that was odd seeing as the last batch didn’t require any kind of permission… they just kind of showed up one day. In either case, it got a bit awkward to say the least… read on…
Layla isn’t what I’d call the most outgoing kid in the world. She gets along with people she knows, but strangers take some time before she’ll warm up to them. Crowds of strangers just seem to make her retreat into a shell that she won’t come out of. I know exactly how she feels as I grew up feeling the same way. With that in mind, a crowd of student nurses was the perfect catalyst for one of the most ridiculously awkward situations I’ve been in in a long time.
I was busy playing with and entertaining the two girls alone before everyone showed up. Everyone was having fun – even the baby in the cage was sitting and watching, his feet hanging through the bars, laughing as he watched. Eventually the nurses showed up, one at a time, to check on the kids. After the first nurse, they continued playing. The second drew some concern, but colouring continued and fun was still had. The third, fourth and fifth nurses… fellow inmate was still okay, but Layla was nearly frozen…
The students’ hearts are definitely in the right place – they are trying to learn and also to entertain and befriend the kids they are assigned to. Layla would have none of it though, seeing the crowd of people staring at her instead of seeing the one nurse who was actually trying to play with her. I did my best to encourage her but she was determined to climb on my lap and wait until everyone left. So I held her and everyone told me she was too tired. There hearts might be in the right place but there heads certainly weren’t – she wasn’t tired so much as she was nervous of everyone around.
One thing that annoyed me, which Tamie later pointed out was maybe okay, was the fact that in the room of six kids, four nurses decided to crowd around my daughter and the inmate she was playing with. I was there watching them and keeping them entertained and the nurses decided that those two kids were the ones that deserved their attention, the four other kids in the room be damned. Later, Tamie pointed out that the students (3 of the 4 nurses) were most likely assigned certain kids that they could interact with and they weren’t allowed to play with the others. Not really a good reason, but a reason nonetheless.
Layla eventually fell asleep in my arms, so we sat on the bed where I read a book while she sawed logs. I’m almost done the book but it seems like every time I get to a good point, Layla wakes up or needs my attention. The last 50 pages are always the hardest, eh?
After she woke up, she refused to move from my chest. I ended up convincing her to get up by asking if she wanted to take a walk. Her nose leash was gone and I knew the IV had a battery from previous experience, so after she put her sandals on I took her out and about for the first time in a long time. She nearly ran out of the room she was so excited. We went to the playroom and she brought back some toys to her bed.
Unfortunately, the toys we took back were not actually the toys she wanted to play with. After returning to the bed, Layla saw the fellow inmate was playing happily with her mom with some building blocks on the little table. Layla, ever the leader, decided she too wanted to play with building blocks on the little table. So, for a while, there was peace – no nurses, a mom and daughter playing with a father and daughter with a small language barrier but still having fun.
And then she showed up. The nurse in the pink apron. The nurse who’s sole duty is to make every baby she interacts with cry out in pain and try to squirm away from her. Yep. The nurse responsible for happily sticking the 6″+ vacuum tube up each babies’ nose, such up any phlegm, mucus or blood that might exist in there. Layla cried at the very sight of her. The actual vacuuming was almost unbearable to listen to… but I know she’s a veteran because 15 seconds after it was done she was silent. The only thing was she was once again stuck to me. I ended up coaxing her down, but only after a baby showed up that she wanted to play with.
Tamie showed up around 17:30, giving me some time to take a break and get a much-needed snack. She stayed with Layla when I took my leave at 18:00, just after Layla got her lunch. When I got back, Tamie informed me that they’d had a HUGE fight. Layla was, apparently, asking for me the whole time… Yep – it felt even better than you could imagine.
Unfortunately, despite Layla’s cries she was quite happy to be with her mom after I returned. I knew she missed her mom so didn’t make too big of a fuss about it… at least, not until tomorrow when she continues to ignore me =).
At 20:00, the lights went out and by 21:00, the visiting hours ended. By 21:10, the nurses were trying to kick us out. We left Layla who didn’t make a peep after we told her we had to bail. She understood and accepted it, not like one of the new kids who cried past 21:00. Tomorrow is another day, another day I look forward to seeing Layla’s progress. Another couple days and we’ll be home again… TIme might fly when you’re having fun but it certainly crawls to a stop when you aren’t.