Ruffy!

 

 

 

This makes me cry. This is Riellys second cousin, Bryan and Heathers baby, Leo. He was born at 27 weeks (Rielly was born at 24 weeks), 3 weeks before Rielly on November 14. He was 2.4 pounds at birth. He was not as fortunate as Rielly and has major issues from being born prematurely. He had massive brain bleeds and will most likely have cerebral palsy. He also may be blind and he is not able to tolerate feedings from a bottle like he used to. He has permanent shunts in his brain that so far have caused alot of problems. They keep getting blocked off and he has had 12 brain surgeries so far. He is still in the hospital and has never been able to come home. Remember this baby when you are saying your prayers. It makes me so sad that they aren't able to enjoy him like we do Rielly.

 

 

My attempt at professional photography, not even close, but still cute. I need a better camera. You can see the heart surgery scar on his back really well here. He is 9.7 pounds and 21 1/2 inches long, Carisa was 9.6 pounds when she was born!

Rielly

Rielly had a follow up visit with a cardiologist on Tuesday. At this appointment, I found out that along with the patent ductus heart "defect" he had, he also had the ductus arteriosis heart defect. The doctors knew this from the beginning but I guess Morgan was told but was probably overwhelmed with information and didn't understand what it meant so she never did tell me. I was alarmed at first, but the doctor said based on how he looks and how his heart sounds, the defect has probably healed on its own. We were so relieved! He needs to have an echocardiogram just to confirm that it has resolved but the doctor said there is no rush to get that done.

The other thing is that he was circumcised a week ago. I felt so bad for him. He was so onery afterward, as he should be! He had it done in the doctors office and the doctor made Morgan and Austin watch. I think I would have died having to watch him in pain. He is a strong little baby, he was fine the next day.

Tyson: Mom, do you know how much I love you?
Me: No how much
Tyson: I love you so much that if you died, I would kill myself just so I could be with you again.

Aaahhh, I love my kid

Happy Mothers Day

Sometimes, it's worth letting the kids write on your hand

Cuteness

Rielly and Kya
Stacies baby Kya, three weeks old today, now at 5 pounds and Rielly 5 months old, now at 9.6 pounds. How cute!

Funny! Although you might have to be a nurse to appreciate it

You KNOW you are a nurse when :-


You believe that all bleeding stops ... eventually.

You find humor in other people's stupidity.

You believe that 90% of people are a poor excuse for protoplasm.

Discussing dismemberment over a gourmet meal seems perfectly normal to you.

Your idea of fine dining is anywhere you can sit down to eat.

You get an almost irresistible urge to stand and wolf your food even in the nicest restaurants.

You plan your dinner break whilst lavaging an overdose patient.

Your diet consists of food that has gone through more processing than most computers.

You believe chocolate is a food group.

You refer to vegetables and are not talking about a food group.

You have the bladder capacity of five people.

Your idea of a good time is a cardiac arrest at shift change.

You believe in aerial spraying of Prozac.

You disbelieve 90% of what you are told and 75% of what you see.

You have your weekends off planned for a year in advance.

You encourage an obnoxious patient to sign a self discharge form so you don't have to deal with them any longer.

You believe that "shallow gene pool" should be a recognized diagnosis.

You believe that the government should require a permit to reproduce.

You believe that unspeakable evils will befall anyone who utters the phrase "Wow, it's really quiet isn't it".

You threaten to strangle anyone who even starts to say the "q" word when it is even remotely calm.

You say to yourself "great veins" when looking at complete strangers at the grocery store.

You have ever referred to someone's death as a transfer to the "Eternal Care Unit".

You have ever wanted to hold a seminar entitled "Suicide ... Doing It Right".

You feel that most suicide attempts should be given a free subscription to "Guns and Ammo" magazine.

You have ever had a patient look you straight in the eye and say "I have no idea how that got stuck in there".

You have ever had to leave a patient's room before you begin to laugh uncontrollably.

Your favorite hallucinogen is exhaustion.

You think that caffeine should be available in I/V form.

You have ever restrained someone and it was not a sexual experience.

You believe the waiting room should be equipped with a Valium fountain.

You play poker by betting ectopics on ECG strips.

You want the lab to perform a "dumb shi* profile".

You have been exposed to so many X-rays that you consider radiation a form of birth control.

You believe that waiting room time should be proportional to length of time from symptom onset.

Your most common assessment question is "what changed tonight to make it an emergency after 6 hours / days / weeks / months / years)?".

You have ever had a patient control his seizures when offered some food.

Your idea of gambling is a blood alcohol level pool instead of a football pool.

You shock someone with an unrecognizable rhythm ... until you get one you DO recognize.

You believe a book entitled 'Suicide: Getting it Right the First Time' will be your next project.

You can identify what kind of diarrhea it is just by the smell.

You will never name a daughter "Melena" or anything along those lines.. and laugh to yourself every time you hear someone by that name

You call subcutaneous emphysema "Rice Krispies".

Your immune system is so well developed that it has been known to attack squirrels in the backyard.

I didn't put in my last post that Carisa is graduating from COLLEGE! (just in case you didn't know)

Carisa graduation pix

So proud of her!

My grandma

My grandma is in a care center now and is on hospice, which means she has less than 6months to live. She has Alzheimers and doesn't recognize very many of her family anymore. It's very sad. I miss my grandma, the way she used to be. She has pneumonia, or at least did last week when this picture was taken. She keeps falling down also. She is so sweet and we all love her.

Ri Ri's first month home

I can't believe it's been almost a month since Rielly has been home. He is doing very well still. He has a few issues that have come up. He has an umbilical hernia, quite a big one. We are hoping it will resolve on it's own. The nurses at the U said this was most likely caused because he grunts alot of the time, which put pressure on his belly button.
He has thrush, a yeast infection, at the roof of his mouth. He also has a very high palate, it sort of looks a little bit like a small cleft palate. It is very weird. We showed his pediatrician and he said we should get it looked at by a specialist. It also could have been caused by the ventilator tubing that was constantly rubbing on the roof of his mouth for quite a while. This is when we noticed the thrush in his mouth.
He also got a little cold, he had a stuffy nose and a cough. We freaked out, ha ha. Took him to the doctor. He's fine. He did lose some weight during the week he was sick though so the pediatrician wants us to put extra formula powder in his bottles and keep a hat on him. We will see today if he has gained weight this past week.
He loves bath time. He lays in the tub and looks like he is in heaven when we pour warm water over him.
We aren't supposed to take him out for a whole year, no stores, no church, no public places. With this whole swine flu deal, I'm even more paranoid about him leaving the house.
He is such a good baby. Doesn't cry very much at all, although when he got his shots 2 weeks ago, it was so sad. He cried and had the biggest frown on his face. It made us all cry.

aaaahhhh!


Going home from the hospital

Angel