Going home today (we hope!)

This little girl is a trooper, but she definately has a grumpy side. She's been like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde - she's either calm, cheerful, and accomodating, or just plan mad at what she has to endure. I can't blame her a bit. She's hardly complained about her leg/ankle hurting at all, but she sure is not a fan of her catheter, the epidural line, oral medicine, blood pressure cuffs, etc. She DOES enjoy the goldfish crackers they supply, and the vast array of princess movies available. We are on our third screening of Snow White as I type.

At about 1 pm the pain specialist came to remove the epidural - Eva was in a down cycle and fussed and cried about having the tape removed (from my own epidural experience I remember that it was the most excruciating part of labor and delivery), then she was upset about the removal of the catheter. For as much as she hated those two intrusions to her body, she was pretty upset after getting them off! The physical therapists came and she was still so upset and tired that we could barely get her to use the little walker (a requirement for going home today), and now at 3 pm she is a completely different child. She's hopping around like she's done this for months and is soooo happy to be unfettered. They gave us the choice of spending another night, but I'm already packed and ready to go - just waiting for the little walker and wheelchair they are renting for us.

Thank heavens this part of the ordeal is over (though it hasn't been too bad, as far as hospital stays go) but we realize we have follow-ups and lots of therapy, and the outcome is far from certain. I just hope that all this will result in a fairly normal life for this amazing girl. She may not be a prima ballerina or a gold medal runner, but as long as she can dance with joy and run after the other kids on the playground, life will be good.

Now it is 3 pm and she is a completely

Eva is out of surgery

I really am a lousy blogger. We've even had fun and interesting stuff to write about, and I still can't come up with a blog entry. I think it is the photos that keep me from writing more often - I can't find an easy way to resize the photos so that they take up less memory, and most days I don't feel like doing the 4 or 5 step process to get them from my camera to this point. But today I make an exception, because it is a day I don't want to forget (though Eva may well want to).

We arrived at Primary Children's Hospital in Salt Lake City this morning at 7. We were able to meet with her doctors before they took her back for surgery, and get the full details on what was happening today. The anesth. wanted to give her Versed before taking her back, just so she was more relaxed, and I am happy to report that we finally have one child who is not an angry drunk! Eva is so funny when she's doped up on that stuff, sweet, ("Helllloooo Mammmmmma") and sooo not like Josh and Esther, who get really mad on that stuff. I wish I could remember the term for what they did today, it was something like tibular osteotomy. Basically they broke both the bones in her left leg to straighten them out some, added a small section of bone to her shorter tibia, added a screw into the growth plate of her longer fibula, and cut notches into her achilles tendon to help stretch it out. Sounds gruesome, but the result is a big pink cast with pink toes poking out of the bottom, and her foot facing forward, as it should. Hoo and ray!

She has, for the most part, handled it like a champ. They decided, after they got in there, that she would do better with an epidural to control pain, and she hasn't complained too much about her leg, but she sure hates the catheter that goes along with the epidural. The most painful part (if I recollect my own epidural experience) will be tomorrow when they remove the needle and pull off that horrendous tape that has been holding it in place. She fussed some, but never really hollered, and was most relaxed as we started making our way through the Surgical unit's princess movie collection.

She perked up quite a bit this evening when Mike and I loaded her into a wheelchair and went down to the cafeteria for some ice cream. I went out for a short run before Mike left, and found myself trapped behind the University Hospital with no way to get through back to Primary's. Finally a security guard took pity on me and opened a door for me - hospitals are the modern version of the labyrinth, I swear!

I got a quick shower (with very feeble water pressure) before Mike left for home (he has to work Thursday & Friday) and Eva and I were settling down for the night when she started itching like crazy. She's been doing this off and on throughout the day, so finally I asked for some Benadryl, and made the colossal mistake of giving her the medicine myself, forcing it into her cheeks when she balked. Dumb, dumb, dumb! Never be the bad guy when there is a perfectly good nurse ready and willing to take the fall! Eva was pretty upset with me that I forced some medicine on her, so it took her another half hour to settle down, but now she is asleep, and I'm going to try to sleep a little as well.

Being here is a sobering experience. Just when you think life is hard for your poor child, you see someone else's child who is suffering far worse, and you wonder how that family survives it all. Twice today we heard LifeFlight come and go, and I wondered about those little children, and their families. There is a lot of hope here at this hospital, as some families come knowing their child will get better (like ours), but there are other families who are devastated by what brings them here. Makes me not want to whine about anything. Don't worry, that will only last me a day or so, and then I'll be back to my normal whining self!

Other posts to follow, hopefully, as I try to stave off boredom during the millionth screening of the Little Mermaid, will include Yellowstone, our trip to the SLC temple to have Eva sealed to us, and the Wasatch Back Relay. Maybe I can even post a few pictures...