Optimism Town

I was feeling pretty good after writing my last post. Even though Harper was making slow progress, I felt confident that she was on the right track, heading for an awesome recovery. Riding the high of my "special needs kids move at their own pace" empowerment, I kissed Harper and left the hospital Saturday night ready for a peaceful sleep.

But Sunday didn't dawn as I had expected. Hospital fatigue set in. Harper's irritability was at an all time high yesterday and she threw up all the applesauce I fed her. We had to give her anxiety medicine just to get her to sleep. Just like that, my attitude went from Optimism Town to Doomsville.

I miss Harper's smile. I wish she wasn't knocked out on pain meds all day. The hospital is tedious and boring. We finally moved out of PICU into the Intermediate Care area, but it still looks like we will be here for quite a few days to come. I miss sleeping next to my husband in our bed. Shit, I miss *seeing* my husband. Eliza is starting to get clingier and tired of the rotating cast of babysitters.

Honestly, I didn't post yesterday because I was embarrassed about my attitude shift and didn't need guests at my pity party.

Then, wouldn't you know, as I was dragging ass into the hospital this afternoon and my crappy attitude was reaching it's peak, there was this:

Eliza was excited to see "Sissy" and our whole family was in the same room together for an hour or so and it was awesome. Turned my frown upside down!

Plus, the Hemispherectomy Foundation sent us a sweet package with some toys, books and a wonderful fleece blanket. The Foundation was started by a family whose child had a hemispherectomy and they are a great place to connect with other families who have been there, done this. It really made me feel like we aren't alone. Plus Harper threw up all over her other blanket so we got the new one at a perfect time ;)

Harper enjoying her new flowery blanket

Overall, Harper is doing better. The doctors think her irritability is a combination of the steroids she's taking to keep the swelling down, the around the clock pain medication and possibly a little extra blood from surgery floating around in her head, irritating her brain. I add in my own hypothesis - she just had her freakin' head cut open, she can't move her left arm or leg and there are people poking her, squeezing her and shining lights in her face every hour. I mean, come on! Not to mention, Harper has always operated at a little, um, "higher frequency" than other kids so I'm not too surprised. I was just hoping surgery would make her *less* irritable. They've started her on an anti-seizure medication that doesn't help seizures, but seems to help kids sleep. Whatever works.

Other than the fussy factor, she's been eating a little more. We're stopping the 24 hour narcotic pain medicine cycle and going down to Tylenol so I hope once she's more alert, she'll be awake more to eat.

For both her Physical and Occupational Therapy sessions today, she got out of bed and sat while supported on the floor. She tried to play with a few toys, although she has a tremor in her right hand which is not permanent, so she wasn't too successful. But just seeing her out of bed was encouraging.

If she has a good night, we'll be moving into the regular care area of the hospital tomorrow and from there we would go home. I hope that is within a few days, but I'm not visiting Doomsville again if it doesn't happen as soon as I would like. Optimism Town has better restaurants, less traffic and still no seizures...