hospital bars

This picture is representative of how Flint and I spent the day on Thursday (April 15, 201o). He had to have his tonsils and adenoids out and have new tubes put in his ears. His surgery was scheduled for 8:30 a.m. we were told to arrive by 7:00a.m. even though I had already registered and filled out all of the paperwork. . . .I arrived at 7:15 thinking that it was a happy compromise and would make the waiting seem a little less long. By 8:00 a.m.Flint was dressed in his Looney Toons hospital gown and ready to go. Actually he was ready to eat and kept asking "bite, pease". I tried to keep him busy with endless games of peekaboo and "where's your . . . . " and reading the one book I had thrown into the diaper bag "Guess how much I Love you". At first I was pleased with how distracted I kept him. He was still in a good mood when 9:00 a.m. hit and I was sure we would see the Dr. any moment. Then we started making circles around the little cubicles of patients waiting that turned into a wagon ride, followed up with lots more peek a boo and "give me five, on the side, break the pickle, tickle, tickle" Where did that last game came from? Must have been buried deep from somewhere in my youth. It turned out to be Flint's favorite throughout our hospital stay. As the minutes passed I became desperate for ideas to entertain and many songs and silly things seemed to keep popping out of my mouth. In all Two and half hours passed before the Dr. and anesthesiologist finally emerged and apologized for the wait. Unforeseen complications during the previous surgery. All I could think was as hard as it was for me to entertain my hungry, thirsty little boy it must have been a thousand times worse for the parents sitting in the waiting room while their child's surgery extended 2 1/2 hours past the scheduled time.

We had to stay over night for a "23 hour" observation because of his age. In a way it felt like a bit of a vacation for me. I had plenty of reading time when Flint was sleeping. In fact I read almost the entire book for book club this week, The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, by Mary ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows. It was a good book. I finished the last few pages Friday afternoon during Flint's nap. It was so nice to have only "one" kid to meet the needs of. No after school craziness with homework frenzy and dinner complaints. No agonizing bedtime routine. I was feeling pretty lucky to have this wonderful one on one time with Flint. I had endless channels and movies to choose from on the T.V. Flint was surprisingly happy in spite of the anesthesia and pain of surgery. I just had to hold him and feed him Popsicles and Gatorade and make sure that his blankie and puppy were picked up every time he dropped them. As well as the Duckie and Goose he acquired during his stay.

I had a friend bring me a Cafe Rio salad to share that evening and that was the beginning of the end of my hospital vacation. Flint wanted to eat. He begged. He cried. He grabbed and in the end I gave in. He had tortilla and beans and pork and even tried the lettuce but spit that back out after a few moments. All of this was after the nurse had expressly said, "absolutely no food until tomorrow." She wouldn't even let me give him applesauce. He was so hungry and quite honestly so was I. So I had sympathy and shared my dinner with him. I did put my foot down when he tried to eat the chips. From that time on the rest of the hospital stay Flint can be characterized by one word, "unreasonable". He wouldn't go to sleep until 11:00p.m. and then of course the nurse had to come in and check on him and woke him up at 1:00a.m. and the true horror settled in. He wanted me to hold me only if I stood and I had to keep all three of his animals from falling and he had to have his blankie wrapped half way around him with the other half clasped in his hand. Meanwhile I had try to keep all the wires and tubing from coming unplugged or getting tangled up so bad we couldn't move. I kept getting whacked in the head with his book and he couldn't get comfortable and was fidgety and I was tired and I just wanted to lie down, or just even sit down, but every time I tried he ended up in hysterics. After awhile I gave up on trying to get him back to sleep and turned the T.V. on. We were watching "Bolt", or I guess I was dozing while Flint was watching and this worked for about 20 min. Then he started in all over again with me having to stand and balance all of his stuff in the exact way that he wanted it. By 4:00a.m. I was ready to loose my mind because now nothing was soothing him. The truth was he was overly tired and just needed to go to sleep, but was so far past the point of tired that he was crazy. I just wanted to go home. I knew if I could just put him in his own bed with all of his stuff and shut the door he would cry for a couple of minutes and then just go to sleep. Finally around 4:15 a.m. he let me just sit him in the chair with all of his stuff perfectly arranged and while sitting perfectly upright, he started to fall asleep when in enters the nurse. She couldn't understand why he was sitting in the chair, "doesn't he sleep in the crib at home?" she asked. "yes" I replied as calmly as I could, "but he doesn't like this crib and he just screams when I put him in it because he can see me and wants me to get him out."

"Oh well why don't you try rocking him to sleep?" she so helpfully suggested.

Ya, I was in no mood for parenting tips from some nurse who was the reason he woke up in the first place. I crankily said, "He didn't want to be held anymore. He just wants to sit here." She just stared at me for a moment and then went about her business to check his blood pressure (which he absolutely hated) and temperature and then make sure his i.v. was still in correctly and in the process knocked down his animals and messed up his blankie and he went into hysterics once again. We both breathed a sigh of relief when she left. By 5:00a.m. Flint had fallen asleep sitting upright in the chair and I could move him to his crib and finally lie back down on the "bench/couch" thing.

It felt like I had just fallen asleep when again their were two nurses in the room. I realized it must be after 7:00a.m. and it was shift change time. I rolled over and refused to talk to or acknowledge either of them and mercifully they managed checking Flint without waking him and he continued to sleep until after 8:00a.m.

I didn't wake up in the best mood, but when the nurse came in with discharge papers at 8:30a.m. that quickly perked me right up. 20 minutes later a sweet elderly woman was wheeling us to the curb. She was horrified that no one was there with a vehicle to pick us up. I explained my car was parked over there and we could walk. She felt that there was no way I could carry the baby and diaper bag and overnight bag and walk all that way. I assured her that we could, thanked her for help and nearly sprinted to the car before someone yanked us back inside the hospital prison!

So glad to be home!!!