I mean, can you imagine having a 16 month old and going through what we went through at the same time?! People did it all.the.time. And I don't know how. I spent my days at the hospital, from morning to night, and sometimes over night. I absolutely would not have been able to do that if Cooper had already been born. Yes, we were on the East coast, and we would have had plenty of family help, and would have needed it that much more, but I still cannot imagine.
Because today, Cooper and I arrived at the hospital a little after 7, and waited for the surgeon to make his rounds. By that time, he was so done, we had to go. There was no stalling, no 'one more kiss', no nothing. It was "Ok, gotta go get him outta here! Love you, see you later!" Oh, and "Happy Anniversary!" So this is what true married with kids life is like, huh? Don't get me wrong, I felt horrible. I hate leaving him here. But I knew I wouldn't really be of any use, and I needed to spend time with my sweet boy. The previous night was horrible for us both - we got back to the Fisher House around 9:15pm, and he had fallen asleep in the car which is horrible for us. Anytime he does that, it's like a power nap for him, and he won't nap afterwards, or go to sleep at night apparently. I nursed him in the room, and put him down in the crib right next to my bed thinking that if he could see me, he'd just lay down and go to sleep. Ha. He stood up and peered over the edge of the crib, reached for my hand and put it to his cheek while sucking his thumb. If the bed was big enough, I would have let him sleep with me but they only had a room with two twins so that wasn't gonna happen. He started babbling, really loud, screaming, laughing, giggling, etc. Mind you, it's now pushing 11pm. There are other people in this house, and I did not want someone knocking on the door because that would have just pushed me over the edge in my overtired state. There was a lot of "please God let him go to sleep. please God give me patience. please God give me patience." I laid him down about 15 separate times like they do on the Supernanny and said "Good night, I love you!" holy cow. I think it was 11:30 before we both finally fell asleep. But it was a night of 'oh please don't let this wake him up' as I tried to readjust as quietly as possible. Then they emptied the dumpster and that was that. 0530, and we were up for the day. For a kid that usually sleeps for 12 hours, I knew he wasn't gonna last long this morning.
Sure enough, as soon as we got in the car to drive down to our friends house, he was asleep. And that didn't bode well for the afternoon nap, but I went with it. I caught a quick cat nap in the target parking lot until he woke up, too. We spent the afternoon with our very generous friend, and I put him down for a nap around 2. I pried myself out of her house after he was asleep but I really didn't want to leave him again. (TMI alert) Tonight was my first night not nursing him before bed since he's been born. Like, for his entire life, he's always had a night time routine of reading, rocking, nursing, and bed. And tonight he didn't have that, and I wasn't the one putting him to bed. And guess what? He didn't even know the difference. That made my heart hurt a little bit, because he no longer really truly needs me. Someone else could take my place if it came to that. That's a sucky feeling. But, in the grand scheme of things, I am SO grateful to have such a go with the flow baby. He went to sleep with no problems tonight she said, and I only hope he'll sleep in tomorrow morning too for her. Clearly, I'm hanging on! I'm going to have to learn to embrace my growing boy or I'm going to miss out on him!
So, I left, and went to about five different places to get Jason an anniversary dinner of California Pizza Kitchen and Cheesecake Factory cheesecake. Of course then I hit the afternoon traffic and that was annoying, but here we are. Spending our anniversary in a hospital room watching Friends, eating starbursts and skittles and drinking pepsi like the good ol days. If it weren't for our friends, we wouldn't be able to enjoy this time together, even though it's a sucky time, I at least feel better knowing I'm here with him, supporting him any way I can. We are so grateful for their help...I almost can't even put it in to words.
As far as his pain goes, he's off all IV pain meds, and it's well controlled with oral meds. We're not sure when they'll take the hard cast off, but we're kind of hoping for tomorrow. He crutched around the halls today (I missed that) and said he felt much better getting up and moving around. He ate a real lunch, and obviously a real dinner which is a huge improvement from yesterday when I could only get him to eat two chicken noodle soup noodles. He's been sitting up in the chair for most of the day too.
Seriously though, I keep getting deja vu or flashbacks or whatever you want to call them. I just had the thought "Ugh, I'm exhausted...I don't feel like walking back to the room..." Except that there's no walking, it's driving ~8 miles back to the Fisher House and we're in Colorado this time, not Maryland, so I can't go home this weekend, or to the beach either. Bummer. It just feels all too familiar, and almost comfortable...and weird that it feels comfortable.
I think tomorrow will be another day of pain control, maybe a few more laps in the hallway, and a poop or two since he has nothing else planned. We're hoping to be discharged by Friday, and we're also hoping to get the cast taken off tomorrow or Friday too.
Thanks for all your thoughts and prayers, things seem to be improving a lot faster this go round!
Stay tuned!
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