Just a visit

Think we will have to go ahead and buy the little monkey a wagon for his upcoming birthday.

Despite the look of concern on his face, the wagon ride through the Mary Bridge halls was Tiernan's favorite part of the day.  We were in hospital for the 6th, count 'em, 6th new GJ tube since January.  This was malfunctioning and leaking like crazy.  We still don't know why or how to prevent the same from happening for the 3rd time in a row.  At any rate, for reasons still unknown to us, we were admitted to the 6th floor...Home Sweet Home.  One of the first people we saw as we walked in was Nicole, one of our very favorite nurses on the med/surg floor.  This began a rather enjoyable day of reunions with many of our former faves.  We saw all the social workers and child life people who helped us so much.  Someone from PICU came down and after recovering from the shock of seeing Tiernan in his current state of chunkiness, she brought us up to show him off to the rest of the PICU friends.  Jaws were dropping everywhere we went.  Poor guy was so scrawny back then.  And now he is just a sight to behold.  Luckily we also ran into Dr. Escobar (peds surgeon who did his G tube and the most recent wound exploration.)  We were supposed to drive back out tomorrow morning for a follow up but he just looked at it and said let's cancel tomorrow.  :)  

It is remarkable how long all the hospital stuff takes.  The process of removing his old tube and putting in the new one takes about 15 minutes.  We had to check in at 7:30 AM and didn't leave until nearly 2.  The rest of the time was spent gabbing with everyone, cruising the halls in the wagon and visiting with our friends Jesse and Luke who came to help us wile away the hours.  It truly is a different world there when your child is not the sickest (or one of the sickest) on the floor.  I always watched the older kids riding the halls in the wagons and wished I could take him out of his room every now and then. I have also been  hoping to bring him in somehow to show how far he has come.  It was really quite fun today to be able to do those things.  And it was even better to gather up our things and walk out those doors on the same day.