Hope's New Digs

We had our first full day in Calgary today and are glad to be back.  Hope seems to like her new room at the Children's Hospital.  It sure is an upgrade from her last room - it is so nice to have some space.  In Edmonton, there was another baby only 4 feet from Hope, now she has her own room, with a TV!  

I was exhausted after our return and needed some time to rest up so I could get better and back to feeling human.  Shawn got up this morning and went into the hospital for rounds while I slept.  I felt better when I got up this morning than I have in days.  I was able to take my time in the morning and felt a lot more relaxed and less stressed.

We left the house at noon and picked up Shawn to grab some lunch   After lunch, he came home with Sadie for a nap and I stayed at the hospital for the afternoon.  Hope had a rough day today.  She finally had the central line pulled and we're hopeful that the infection will clear quickly.  Being septic twice in the 25 days since she was born is not a good thing!  The loss of a central line meant new IV lines for Hope.  She has to have two lines, one of them went in the first time but the second one took two tries before it went in.  They were checking her blood sugars and gases along with other things and, as a result, there were a lot of needles and poor Hope was not a happy girl.  

It's a very painful thing, as a mother, to be standing next to your screaming daughter and not be able to pick her up and console her.  When I say screaming I am truly reaching, as her vocal chords are not working properly at the moment and it's more of a screech.  They are going to look into whether the chords were damaged from the breathing tube and will heal quickly, or were damaged during surgery and will likely take more time to heal.  I long for the day that I can pick her up anytime she cries and rock her back to sleep.  Although I have a lot of fear when I think about bringing her home, I also long for that day.