A New Day!

Watching the Clock

When Joy was put on the morphine pump she would sit there and watch the clock. She could push it every 10 minutes. Since she is just learning numbers it took awhile to catch on. They can track how much it is pushed and they said it was about 290 times the first 8 hours.


The Bullens came for a Visit
A much needed respit from seeing Joy in so much pain for the last few days. The girls stayed with Mercy and Joy and let Lisa and I go across the street for lunch and a coffee break. Thank you my friend!

The doctors are going to discharge Mercy on Monday and there is talk of Joy too! Last night was the first time I had seen a smile on her face since last Tuesday. She has been in so much pain, but part of that pain may be anticipated pain. After that epidural mishap it seemed she was very afraid of anything after that and would moan and groan all the time and very lethargic. The docs took Joy off NPO and let her have clear liquids yesterday afternoon and you could just see the life come back to her.
Though when we got her out of her bed to pee pee she was shuffling and moaning again last night. She woke up about the same and had a chest xray last night and another this morning and the doctors finally said they could take the chest tube out.
Dr Martin and Joy

Dr Martin taking out the Chest Tube

Miss Molly the Child Life Specialist distracting her
The Child Life specialist are great here. They help with distraction and breathing techniques to help kids get through procedures. Miss Molly helped Joy work through getting her tube out. It was painful but over quickly. Poor Dr. Martin was being so patient and gentle but still told me how hard it is to see the little ones in pain like that. He was great.
About 2 hours after that trauma was over she wanted to go for a walk! Yep, she's back! But as we were getting her up she said her hand hurt and I looked and her IV hand was swollen so we are waiting for the numbing cream to take effect on the other hand to insert another IV line.
I think if she starts walking around and eating well tomorrow they may let her be discharged Monday too!


The Last Tube comes out!

Mercy is tube free (except a PIC line for antibiotics) and when I told her this morning she hadn't had any pain medication since yesterday afternoon she looked confused. I think she thought the antibiotics they were giving her was pain meds. It is so funny though, after she eats about half of one of her meals she falls into a deep sleep. Like she just had a huge Thanksgiving dinner. Yep, her stomach is now telling her brain that food is getting there! It is wonderful to see.

Bring Your Child to Work Day!



This week at Dans work was "Take your child to work" day. Grace has been waiting for this day for probably four years. You have to be eight and this was her year to go! Dan said she had a great time helping daddy all day. Though when he told me he had her wiring electrical boxes I got a little nervous! I was so glad she got that time with him.