The Puddles

Ben received this balloons and teddy bear gift from Geneva Rescue yesterday.  It was very sweet.  He received another fire truck/balloon basket from Tree of Life yesterday too.  He loves it all!  It is sometimes lonely here at the casa without others.

is trying our patience.  Don’t get me wrong.  He looks great. Fabulous.  A true miracle. But . . . if that boy lives to see his next birthday I’ll be shocked.

Reasons . . .

1.  My neighbor stopped by yesterday to find Ben in the backyard barefoot and without a jacket and it was only 50 degrees and he just had open heart surgery less than a week ago.  What kind of a mother does she think that I am?  Of course, I was upstairs and didn’t know that he was outside.

2.  Ben and Ainsley were taking turns jumping off the stairs to the ground.  And I am not talking about the first step.

3.  Ben was walking around carrying a 10 lb dumbbell that he dug out of the under the stairs closet. (He is not suppose to carry anything at all.)

4.  Ben pulled the dinner room chair over to the kitchen cabinet in order to climb up to get something out.

5.  Ben was running and then sliding on his knees.

See what I mean. I just got the boy fixed.  He is desperately trying to get himself sent back to the hospital.  I swear that I am this close to tying him down to a chair.  What am I going to do with that boy?

Pray. Smile. Pray some more. Scold him. Pray. And then try not to let him see me laugh.

I know that we have not been posting much lately.  I didn’t even call my mom to say that we had made it home (Bad daughter!).  We got home, ate dinner, loved on everyone, told stories, told more stories, told even more stories, finally went to bed exhausted.

I was tired.  But that good kind of tired.  Tired of all of the drama both in and out of the hospital, but glad to get home and resume our peaceful life. (or at least as peaceful as you can be with three kids).

Ben is examining the ding in the side of Dad’s truck.  Almost everything we are taking home on this day as a new scar!  Both Ben and the truck!  But at least they both still work beautifully!

Erika was our nurse while Ben was in the 15th cardio floor at TCH.  For three days, she helped us out with BenBen.  She was patient and kind with Ben.  And always with a gentle voice.  Thank you, Erika.

We are ready to walk out the doors and say goodbye for this time.

Here is a picture of Ben pulling out his own i.v. Pulling out your iv means you are officially going home.  He was so excited he didn’t mind pulling out the “straw.”

This is Shelby.  Ben’s new hospital friend.  I only wish we had met her one day earlier.  Shelby had open heart surgery two weeks ago and still needed to stay a little longer at TCH.  Ben loved racing with her around the floor.  She had a John Deere peddle tractor.  How cool!  They visited each others room and played with each others toys.  It was very sweet.  Ben kept talking about his hospital friend Shelby.  It was the first child his age that he ever met with the same scars as him.  We pray that Shelby gets out soon.

We are going home! Hallelujah! Ben has been stellar throughout all of this until they went to remove two knots at the top and bottom of his incision. Suddenly he had a meltdown. All he needed to do was have two fishing lines knots cut and he melted.  We didn’t know that they were going to do that today, so we hadn’t talked to Ben about it.  He kept saying, “Let me think about it. Let me just think about it first.” Poor guy.  The easiest of all of the procedures and he was just plan tired of being poked.

But we are done. He is taking laps with Dad around the floor. I am being paged by Ben.

It is the end of Day 5.  Do you want to know when it time to go home? When your son wears his name tag off.  They are having to scrounge up a new one tonight.  The day has been somewhat uneventful.  No major tests.  We did have several visitors which brightened Ben’s day.  Ms. Shirley , Mr. Lawrence, and Ms. Jan came for a visit today.  They sat with Ben for an hour while I took a break.  It was good that they came when they did. I was exhausted.  My morning coffee caffeine load had run dry and I was needing some caffeine to finish out the day until 9pm.

The moment of the day was when Ben shooed me out the door after I told him that I was leaving.  He said, “I’ll be fine. GO!” Ben really likes the balloons that they brought but I am slowly loosing my patience with them.  He thinks that they are a batting toy of some sort. But they are cute!

We go in for some tests tomorrow.  This may be our ticket home, so I hope that they turn out well.

We met a friend tonight. Her name is Shelby and she has been here for two weeks.  She has a condition where she was born with only half of her heart.  She is five and has a John Deere peddle tractor that she rides all over the 15th floor.  Ben had his police car and Shelby had her tractor and they made a lap around the 15th floor.  Ben hardly said two words to her, but he said that he was so excited to have a hospital friend. He is planning on asking her to ride with him tomorrow.

We came back from our ride and took a hospital bath that includes cleaning our hair.  Ben said that he feels so much better now. We have our jammies on and we are getting ready for bed.  Dad should be here soon and then I am off to bed as well.  Sorry there are not any pictures today.  Hopefully Dad will upload some tonight on his blog.  Until the morning . . . good night!

When in the midst of drama, you tend to forget about the world around you.  Consumed by the events that we have been dealing with has been difficult but we are starting to peer out into the world and think past the moment. So many kind people have asked about Madie and Ainsley.  They are great.  They have been spoiled by so many people lately.  My mom called to say that they just dropped them off with the third set of adults prepared to spoil the heck out of my girls.  Marsha and Lonnie are at the house right now.  I am almost afraid to call and check on everybody since I am sure that I would just interrupt a perfectly good time.

They spent the weekend at Grandma and Papa G.’s house.  Papa pulled out the yard decorations and the girls apparently helped set up “Candyland” as the girls called it.

Aunt Deb and Uncle Dave bought a purple Christmas tree for the girls to decorate.  Isn’t it pretty? It was a very special something for the girls.

Marsha and Lonnie haven’t seen the girls in a year.  Ainsley used to go over almost everyday to see Marsha at the church office and give her a big hug.  Marsha hasn’t had that for a while, so I think Ainsley will enjoy the next few days giving Marsha extra cuddles.

My Madie is such a worrier that she is stressing out about the family and doesn’t even realize it.  I think that is certainly what made her sick on Friday night.  She seems fine now.  They even went to church this morning.  My mom said that they were talking about BenBen at mom’s church and Madie had her hand up to contribute to the conversation.  Unfortunately, the Pastor didn’t see Madie’s hand in the air or I am sure that Pastor Joe would have called on her to say something.

I can’t wait for a typical Saturday morning where we are all in our bed with morning cartoons on while we cuddle with everyone.  Soon enough, it will be that way again.