Sick, Sick, Sick

Mommy is sick
Daddy is sick
And Drewby is sick too
What can it be?
We've all got the flu

Did you not get the last vaccination?
Influenza b seems to be the explanation
Not covered by that shot, so we are told
So now we are driving this sore congested road

We three are now in our most favourite place
To strangle this germ and kick it in the face
Where is this great spot, oh it sounds like such fun
The ICU of course is where we make this bug run

Here we now wait as Drewby gets well
No worries though, cause he thinks the place swell
Attention, admiration, much playing he gets done
Much thanks we must give those who care for this one

So what do we need, what is there to say?
Please think of us three by remembering to pray
Ask Jesus to heal our small family
We want to go home where it's only us three

Much apology is given for this poem that is lame
It is the Dad of the three where you must lay your blame
or maybe the flu...

One day in the life...

Wednesday, March 2, 2011
(for those interested in the minute details)

• 7:27 Drew wakes up and nurses (before you congratulate me on having a kid who sleeps in so late, let me note that 5am-7:30am was the longest consecutive stretch of sleep he got all night)
• 7:48 Drew plays on the bed with Daddy, Elmo, Grover, Ted and 4 soothers while mama showers
• 8:11 Drew cuddles in the carrier with mama and helps to get the morning Piracetam ready (cut the pills, crush the pills, dissolve the pills in water, mix with just enough lemon yogurt, and a little bit of baby oatmeal so its thick enough to stay on the spoon), make daddy's coffee, clean the suction bucket, and make mama's oatmeal
• 8:27 Drew and Mama sit down to eat breakfast at the table. Drew has a couple Puffs to get him started, but is not at all focused on eating his yogurt and Piracetam. We persist through multiple rounds of drop-the-spoon, fling-the-Puffs, and whip-around-to-look-out-the-window
• 8:54 We enlist Daddy to take over with the Piracetam since Mama is going to be late for work
  
• 8:56 Drew disagrees with this plan, cries, and holds his breath. We immediately hook up oxygen to his trach and he recovers quite quickly; it was a minor spell but was accompanied by a seizure
• 8:58 Drew has a sleepy recovery in Mama's arms
• 9:32 Drew is alert enough to play on the floor with Daddy. Mama leaves for work, she will be late (again)
• 10:05 Drew cuddles up in Daddy's arms in the easy chair for his morning nap
• 11:45 Drew wakes up and helps Daddy do a load of laundry
  
• 12:27 Mama comes home! Drew scoots down the hall as fast as his hands and knees can carry him
• 12:30 Drew nurses/plays on the bed with Mama
• 12:42 Drew hangs on Mama's legs in the kitchen while she gets lunch ready
  
• 12:55 Drew eats a pita chip, a few peas, and a couple bites of cheese and bacon** from Mama's pasta for lunch while Daddy showers.
  
• 1:15 Mama gets Drew dressed and his equipment ready to go
• 1:23 Drew and Daddy walk Mama to work and run a few errands at the bank and drugstore. Drew rides in his stroller like a champ, considering that he wouldn't even tolerate it a few months ago.
• 2:45 Drew and Daddy arrive back home
• 3:00 Drew naps in the easy chair with Daddy
• 5:00 Drew has his afternoon Piracetam and yogurt with Daddy
• 5:38 Mama comes home!
  
• 5:45 Drew nurses/plays with Mama (he's more interested in the playing this time)
  
• 6:00 Drew cuddles in the carrier with Mama while she makes supper, when she needs to put him down to get things done he sits at the kitchen door with Daddy and they throw things at Mama while she works
  
• 6:38 Drew sits down to supper of cheerios, quinoa salad**, and pureed pears, he eats some.
• 7:02 Drew and Daddy clean up the toys while Mama cleans up the kitchen (oh dishwasher, how you have changed my life for the better!)
• 7:27 Drew has a wild bath in the kitchen sink
• 7:40 Drew is dryed, diapered, and dressed all while trying to escape
• 7:54 Daddy gives Drew his Pulmacort through a nebulizer that attaches to his trach
• 8:03 Mommy and Drew do some toothbrush wrestling/ brushing
• 8:11 Mommy reads Drew 4 books (Jamberry, Open the Barn Door, My Nose My Toes and Me, and Hand Hand Fingers Thumb)
• 8:17 Drew nurses
• 8:32 Mama rocks Drew to sleep in the carrier.
• 9:06 Drew is asleep. Mama holds him on the bed (and types this blog with one hand)

**we balance out our super healthy foods with super junky foods so as to keep our overall food-healthiness quotient stable

Freedom

Warning: This post contains words. Possibly too many of the mind numbing variety. Feel free to skip down to the pictures if you so please.

It's been 53 weeks now. Seems longer, so say the bags under my eyes and the gray hairs appearing on my head. Seems shorter too. What can I say? On the surface not much, what with the thoughts that seem to scatter around my brain then escape with barely a memory of their presence. A wee bit tired I reckon. I want to share some reflections of this year however, so please humor me. And please be patient...

I love taking care of Drew during the day while Karla is at work. It is challenging and it requires all of my energy, and there are times when I'm barely holding on physically, but I love it. Drew and I share the bond of father and son, but we also share the bond of our illness (whatever that illness is). Any parent will tell you that having children will change your life in many ways. A major change is the inability to do all the things you used to do in the time you used to do them. Obvious statement.

Drew requires our visual attention at all times. Because of his tracheostomy he is unable to vocalize. In some ways that's nice as we don't have to experience any bloodcurdling screaming in the middle of the night. Problem is that every time Drew cries he is at risk for holding his breath. So we can't let him cry, but because we can't hear him we have to watch him. Luckily he follows me wherever I go anyway so watching him isn't much of a problem (like his mommy Drew considers me his hero...). Drew still holds his breath, "an episode" as our medical team like to say, 4-15 times per week no matter how much we watch. Each of these episodes is life-threatening. That might sound overly dramatic, but there is no other way to state it. Every time Drew stops breathing, goes blue, and does his bit to go stiff and sometimes have a seizure, we wonder if he'll breathe again. So far he has, although with varying degrees of prompting.

Major life change, no? Fortunately as parents we don't know anything else. Drew is our first child so we have nothing else to compare t0. The comparison game is a risky bit of business anyway so I'm better to do my best to steer clear of that (although wandering that road has it's way of reminding me of just how blessed I am). It's still hard though and sometimes I bemoan my lack of freedom. This happens especially if I compare this reality to what I thought having a child would be like. Then the burden of this reality can feel like prison (yikes, who dialed up the self-pity?).

As a Christian I think about freedom differently, at least I should. Freedom isn't the ability or right to do whatever I want. In fact, that's just another form of slavery. For me freedom is losing myself and gaining Jesus Christ. Then my freedom isn't in doing whatever I want but in responding to what I have received, which is life! So even though caring for Drew takes everything we have, we should look at this as an opportunity rather than a burden. As much as that sounds great, the truth is we don't have much time or energy to think about it. At least if we have the proper attitude we're hopefully on the right track.

Yup. Almost definitely mind numbing. Methinks blogs are better suited for pictures rather than random introspection. Who knows? Not me, I'm too tired...

db

HAPPY BIRTHDAY DREW!

One year ago today.

Like the rest of the city, we had Olympic fever:

Our red shirts did triple duty, celebrating Valentines Day, Chinese New Year, and Team Canada.
We walked and walked and walked, along with hundreds of others, taking in the Olympic sites:

(Robson and Granville)

We thought we had a few weeks until everything would change.
And we thought we knew what to expect.
So naive.

kb