He finally slept last night, and now that he’s off the IV antibiotics, they decided to release Alex from the hospital. He’s still coughing, but hopefully that’ll go away by the time the oral antibiotics are done this time.
Of course, as soon as he sat on the couch at home he fell asleep. I hope his nap doesn’t mean he’ll be up half the night.
In other news, he has an appointment with his cardiologist tomorrow. I’ll schedule the post requesting the prompt words for the rest of the month tomorrow afternoon when I think I’ll be home. In case I’m not, I’ll be counting on you to read the rules! Watch out for that at 1pm EST.
He’s still in hospital. He had two hours of sleep last night and one more hour when I arrived at the hospital this morning at 4:00am, because I made him lay down.
He’s still on his feet.
Total sleep since Sunday (01/13) morning: four hours. It is now Tuesday, 9:40pm.
Hoping he’ll come home tomorrow. It’s boring enough here to allow him to doze off.
Thanks to all who commented on my last post. I appreciate the good thoughts and prayers, more than you know.
Before I start really writing this post, I have to mention that I’m punch drunk from staying up for thirty-four hours. I feel like my eyeballs are swimming in frontal lobe fluid, if there is such a thing. So I apologize in advance if this post isn’t grammatically correct, sensical, or replete with the correct amount of outrage, though that last one really shouldn’t be a problem.
You see, after I wrote last night that if I didn’t show up until late today, I was probably dealing with some challenges, I tried to put Alex to bed and failed. He began coughing, then he began having a hard enough time breathing that I figured it was time for the hospital. We arrived there at about 10:40pm.
But of course when he wasn’t laying down, he wasn’t that bad. So we sat. And sat, and sat. I’m not sure what time it was when he got a room with a bed–1:30 maybe?–but I remember looking at the clock at 4:44 when he was getting his IV in. They brought me a breakfast at 5 … Saw the second doctor of the night at 9:30 … Got a room on the floor (he was admitted with pneumonia, again) at about 3:15, and I got out of there at 4pm. I think I slept for about 45 minutes, sitting in a chair. And Alex did no better. The few times he dropped off other than the 45 minutes he got when I slept, they woke him up after 3 minutes of sleep.
He was still refusing to lay down when I left.
So yeah, all that to say Alex is back in the hospital for at least one night. And I’m falling asleep while I tyepzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
I love to explore, to discover the undiscovered. Whether it’s downtown Kingston, Ontario
or downtown Tokyo
I live to find out what’s around the next corner when I’m out and about, traveling. Unless, of course, I’ve been on a plane for thirteen hours and can’t find my hotel.
I suppose I’ve been lucky so far to not turn any corners that led to worse things than being hopelessly lost, alone, in the dark, in a country where any modicum of Japanese I possessed had fled my brain cells and been replaced by the need for sleep.
But lately, I’ve been coming across things that I’d rather stay undiscovered. For instance, I didn’t really want to know that my laptop couldn’t be fixed by Best Buy. Even if I’d wanted them to try, they couldn’t ship it to the place where they get them fixed, because the hinge won’t let us close it. And they wouldn’t ship it in the open position, even in a square box. So I’m now on my brand new laptop that’s smaller and less-fancy, and has a power button right beside the delete button.
I was on the verge of bringing it back–can you imagine working on something for an hour just to turn off the computer by accident?–when I realized I could change what the button does in the settings. Now I can safely press it and nothing happens unless I hold it down for a few seconds. Because I seriously don’t want to discover the alternative.
And then there’s Alex, who came home from his dad’s today sick again. I’ll try to get him an appointment with his doctor tomorrow, but I fear we’re going to end up back at the emergency again. Maybe even tonight. I just hope it’s not a new bout of pneumonia. He has a cardiologist appointment next week, too. And though I know it’s better to know sooner rather than later how soon he’ll need heart surgery again, I’m not looking forward to knowing.
On that miserable note, if you want to read a happier story, click the link under “can’t find my hotel” above. It’s a good one.
The prompt word, “undiscovered,” for today’s post is brought to you by Teresa! Thanks, Teresa! To find her “undiscovered” post, click here.
At the risk of sounding like I’m moaning–I never do that, do it?–Alex was home for the day again, still coughing even though it’s been almost two weeks since he came out of hospital with pneumonia.
I assumed they were going to give him his flu shot at school, like they always have, but they’ve stopped doing it. Now I have no idea whether he should get it or if we should wait until he’s completely better.
In all, it was one of those days where you wish you had a parenting owner’s manual. You know those days, right?
Should I send him to school or shouldn’t I? Should I cut him some slack because he might be misbehaving because he’s sick? Or is he pushing my buttons because he got out of going to school and now he’s seeing how much further he can go?
Ugh. Yeah, it was one of those days.
But now he’s at his dad’s, finally. First time since the first week of November. I’m feeling the exhaustion–it’s hitting me like a tonne of bricks. I think I might go to bed. And stay there until Sunday.
Have a good one, my friends.
The prompt “flew/flu/flue,” for today’s post is brought to you by M. Oniker! Thanks, M! To find her latest post, click here.
I’m going out on a bit of a limb with today’s prompt in that I’m stretching to use it.
It was brought to mind by a comment on Facebook concerning my misstep and my broken laptop of the last time I was carrying something precious and I did the same thing. What actually happened, both last night and that last time was I thought I was on the last step but I still had two to go. So when I took that last step, I realized I’d stepped out too far, thinking I was stepping onto the floor. I could have caught the edge of the bottom stair, but I made the conscious decision in that split second to try to take both. Catching the edge of the last stair would have caused me to fall, but I might have saved the laptop. As it was, I decided to save myself instead. All in that split second.
The brain’s ability to make such decisions in that much time is even more astounding than my mad Paint skillz.
I know you’re still wondering what all this has to do with a sunrise. I’m getting there.
The last time this happened to me, I was carrying this guy.
Except at the time, he was only a couple of months old. That time, again I had the presence of mind to make a decision: fall and save what I was holding, or save myself.
I ended up in the emergency room, he didn’t even wake up.
But he did live to see another sunrise.
The prompt word, “sunrise,” for today’s post is brought to you by Toortsie! Thanks, Toortsie! To find her “sunrise” post, click here.
No, I’m not talking about in the Seinfeld sense, so you can please just wipe that idea from your brain right away. I’m talking about my house. My home. The place that rather than hang my hat, I usually toss it on a piece of furniture because there’s some crisis or another taking shape the second I walk in the door.
Someone once said to me that a perfect house in which children live is a house with miserable children. I’m not sure that’s true–maybe there are parents who are just that organized. If so, and if you’re out there, tips are welcome.
Or maybe I just really need a hat rack.
This very short, very late post was brought to you by the prompt word “master,” given us today by Sadje! Click here to find her Just Jot it January post and say hi!
I’m not sure how I managed to forget I took this photo with all the updates I’ve done recently on Alex’s health. Good news is our first full day back from the hospital was uneventful. Things are definitely looking up since this, the evening of December 26th when he fell asleep sitting up on the couch after a full day of non-stop coughing.
Yes, that was three lines and this is four: do your best to keep it to one line. 😛
Here are the general rules to follow for Just Jot it January:
1. Just Jot It January starts January 1st, but it’s never too late to join in! Here, we run on the honour system; the “jot it” part of JusJoJan means that anything you jot down, anywhere (it doesn’t have to be a post, it can even be a grocery list) counts as a “Jot.” If it makes it to your blog that day, great! If it waits a week to get from a sticky note to your screen, no problem!
2. I’ll post the daily prompts at 2am my time (GMT -5), every day except for Saturday’s Stream of Consciousness (SoCS) prompt–you’ll find that one on Friday morning at 9:30am. That daily post (i.e. this one) will be where you leave your link for others to find in the comment section. There will be a prompt for every day except Wednesday, when the prompt is simply my One-Liner Wednesday.
2a. Since today is Wednesday, I challenge you to make your JusJoJan post a one-liner. If you don’t care to, or if you’ve already written your post, no problem. Remember, with One-Liner Wednesday you can write anything – it’s only a prompt to write one line, not necessarily to keep to the same theme as mine. The rules that I’ve made for myself (but don’t always follow) for “One-Liner Wednesday” are:
(i) Make it one sentence.
(ii) Make it either funny or inspirational.
(iii) Use our unique tag #1linerWeds.
(iv) Enjoy yourself!
(v) Use our One-Liner Wednesday badge.
#1linerWeds badge by Cheryl, at dreamingreality646941880.wordpress.com/
3. As long as your blog is on WordPress, you’ll be able to link via pingback. To execute a pingback, just copy the URL from the daily prompt post, and paste it anywhere in your post. Check to make sure your link shows up where you want it to, and go back occasionally to see other bloggers’ entries – the more you visit others, the more they’ll visit you! If you’re participating from another blogging host, just drop a link into the comment section. Note: The newest pingbacks and comments will appear at the top.
4. Tag your post JusJoJan and/or #JusJoJan.
5. Write anything! Any length will do! It can even be a photo or a drawing – you’re going to title it, right? There’s your jot!
6. The prompts are here both to remind you and to inspire you to write. However, you don’t have to use the prompt word of theday. You can link any kind of jot back here. Note: If it’s 18+ content, please say so in a comment with your link or close to your pingback.
7. If you’d like to, use the JusJoJan badge so that others can find your post more easily.
He’s still coughing, still having a bit of a tough time breathing, but his cardiac numbers were better and we decided home was a better place to be. So I’ll watch him closely for the next couple of days, and hopefully we’ll be all back to our normal chaos for his second week of Christmas vacation.
Just Jot it January 2019!
The first of January is tomorrow already!!
Normally, I’d have gathered up prompts by now from all of you, but with the mess this past weekend has been, it just wasn’t happening. So I’m going to do something different for the first week this year.
Tomorrow’s jot will be whatever you want to do with it, though I will post a prompt post just so you have something to ping back to. Wednesday the 2nd will be the regular one-liner, and on Thursday I’m thinking of doing something special. Maybe. We’ll see. Sometime before Sunday, though, I’ll post a request for prompts from you to get us through the rest of the month.
Stay tuned for the Just Jot it January rules post coming up right after this one.
I woke up from nine hours of sleep this morning and called the hospital before I got out of bed. The nurse I spoke to was a nice lady named Heather who introduced herself as someone who used to work at Alex’s school, so she knows a bit of sign language.
She told me he had a good night and was up early, out of bed, and following his nurse (the one on shift from last night) around in the corridors. He got tired of his IV, probably when another IV pole with his feeding pump was added to the mix, so he unhooked the IV. They left it off.
When Heather came in at 7:00, he took one look at her and knowing she had the ability to tell him off in ASL, he went back to bed.
“That was a couple of hours ago though,” she told me. “Now he’s following me around.”
He was doing okay, so I decided to have a shower and take my time getting to the hospital. Only to immediately be told to go home when I got there … by Alex. I sent this text to my best friend, John:
At the hospital waiting to see the doctor. Alex wants me to go home. I’m cramping his style. Sitting alone in his room while he hangs out with the nurses.
To which John replied:
I can sympathize. It’s hard to woo a nurse with your mom around.
So he’s obviously feeling better. But they wanted to keep him one more night for observation. His oxygen levels are still very low when he’s laying down, his heart rate is still through the roof, and he’s still working to breathe.
Hopefully he’ll be home tomorrow and all the heart issues will have arisen from the combination of the pneumonia and the extra drugs. And hopefully the antibiotics will work their miracle.
Thank you again for all your awesome well-wishes. I appreciate each and every one.
lindaghill.com 