Let’s all go to the lobby… let’s all go to the lobby!
Ok…..BACK UP!
I was going to go to the hospital early this morning because a rep from the state long term care program was coming to assess Brendan. But an accident on the freeway had the whole thing shut down and I figured traffic would be a nightmare. So Trevor and I went through his normal morning, and he was having a nice nap.
And then the phone rang!
The discharge nurse wanted my consent over the phone to transfer Brendan out of the ICU to a small hospital where we can do our training and prep for homecoming! All I could say is WHHHHAAAAAT? TODAY?!!
Trevor and I packed up and got to the hospital as quickly as possible. Trevor actually slept the whole way there, it was nice he was able to continue his nap.
When we walked in, word had gotten around and everyone we passed was saying congrats. Brendan was out of his crib, sitting on the floor in a bouncy, wearing a tshirt and looking too cute just waiting to get the heck out of there!!
One of the things we had to do is have Brendan’s friend Jennifer from Child Life finish updating his Beads of Courage. I posted about it before, but if you don’t remember, Beads of Courage is a program for kids where they get different colored beads to document their hospital stay. It tells their story of treatment and gives them something to look back on later. I really love the program and Brendan has quite a string going. Just for example, he gets one yellow bead every time he sleeps overnight in the hospital. He gets a rainbow bead every time he has PT, a red bead for every transfusion, a glow in dark for every echocardiogram, a pale green for every xray, etc. He gets gorgeous hand made beads for milestones and significant days of courage.
http://www.beadsofcourage.org/
Brendan has an almost 40ft long string going back to his birthday!
It turned a lot of heads today to have his beads there for discharge. The staff all know what it means and many were pretty amazed at Brendan’s journey.
He will keep collecting his beads for clinic visits and echos and shots and things, even when he eventually goes back for his next heart surgery.
Trevor did such a good job today being a happy baby, especially with all of the chaos! He just got a little slaphappy!
Good thing there was still room for Trevor in the whale after we got all of Brendan’s stuff packed!
Bill helps the transport team from the other hospital get the car seat set up right for Brendan! He didn’t have to take an ambulance, just a nice transport van.
All ready to go!
Jennifer even made Brendan a going away poster and got all the staff to sign it for him. It is really special – there are so so so many people that have been involved in his care these last few months!
He is all settled in for now in his new room. We had too much work to do with admissions paperwork and helping the staff get to know Brendan so I did not take pictures yet in the new place. I will work on that part tomorrow! We are so excited and proud of Brendan. He may come home as early as the 28th. What a perfect birthday present that would be for me!!
We have work to do to get ready! We’ll be interviewing a nurse on Friday for his at home overnight care. I could go on and on, but I will save the rest for tomorrow’s blog. Very good night!!