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We’re Home!!!!
This was on the elevator door in the children’s hospital. I think it sums up our little guy pretty well.
For those of you who haven’t been following along, Eli had a 13 hour surgery on Wednesday, the 17th. Spent 4 days in the ICU and 4 days on the general floor recuperating. Everyone who walked into his room from the very first moment he came out of surgery, commented on how kids who have the unifocalization procedure usually have lots of lung issues and his lungs sounded perfectly clear. Time and time again we heard, “You know this isn’t the norm, right?” Yes, we know. We were feeling unbelievably blessed.
Elijah did amazingly well and was discharged from the hospital on Thursday. We weren’t sure what time we would be discharged so we spent one more night at the Ronald McDonald House and headed out to the airport on Friday morning.
We were so happy to finally get home at 6:30 Friday night. The kids jumped up and down with joy when they saw him. Evie was so happy to see her buddy.
We knew that Ben and Maisey understood much more this trip and their relief at having Eli home was very visible. Within five minutes, they were all cuddled up together on the couch with their suckers.
They spent most of the night sitting together on the couch watching videos and laughing. It was a wonderful evening and such a blessing!
We are getting ourselves psyched up for round two on October 20th with Evie in Boston, but for the next couple of weeks we will be lying low and letting Little Guy heal.
I thought I’d share a few memories of our trip to Stanford.
Here are the sculpture outside the front of the hospital. I would love to do these in our yard.
We would Facetime daily so that Eli could see the kids. For the first day or two after surgery he would just look at the kids. He wouldn’t say a word, but the kids loved knowing he was okay.
We were lucky enough to get into the Ronald McDonald House this time. They are expanding because their waiting list is often close to 50 families. There was a shuttle and it was only a beautiful, tree-lined, 10 minute walk from the hospital.
The shuttle made us laugh every time we saw the catch phrase. We never did find “Hope” there. 🙂
If you ever get the chance to support your local Ronald McDonald House, please do so.
Across from the Ronald McDonald House there is a mall with a wonderful fresh food market. We walked and got watermelon and apples quite a few times. There is also a McDonalds. Ha! Imagine that. It was where Eli wanted to eat the two times we had time to eat out. There were many cute shops and restaurants. There was a P. F. Changs and a Flemings Steakhouse. I tried my hardest to talk him into noodles but he wanted nothing to do with it so we were off to McDonalds again for a happy meal.
When your daddy makes fun nugget animals all the time, where else would you want to eat?
The two words used to describe Eli on the trip were cute and charming. He really is a pretty mellow guy most of the time. On both of our long flights we had people comment about how he is the best little traveler they had ever seen. The gentlemen in front of me went on and on about how he tries to encourage mothers who are doing a good job. He commented on Eli being so good and I told him I could not take credit for Eli’s mellowness. He is just an easy going guy. The gentlemen who was very nice just keep gushing on. I just couldn’t do it, mainly because to take credit for Eli being a good traveler meant I would have to take the blame for Evie when she travels and gets tired of the whole deal, which usually happens about hour two in the air. Evie is a beautiful soul with a over the top personality. She just gets a little cranky about hour two in the air. 🙂
One of the sweetest memories came after one of the most traumatic for Eli. They were getting ready to take out his three chest tubes. There were six nurses standing around his bed to be able to pull them at the same time. They had to cut the strings first and get everything ready. After you pull the chest tube, you pull the strings really tight and suture shut the openings. He was afraid of everyone around his bed and was crying. The nurses pulled the tubes, Eli looks up at them, and in the sweetest little voice Eli says, “Thank you!”
He really is the sweetest little guy. What a blessing it is to have more time with him. Thank you prayer warriors for your prayers. We appreciate them more than we could ever put into words.
