Bre's Home

She was discharged today around 3:30 pm. The boys and I were happy to have her with us. Let's hope they're as good for her in the days to come as they have been for me. This whole week, they haven't woken up before 8 am. We'll see. She hurts a little, but nothing requiring medication. She's sleeping now. I love her and hated seeing her in so much pain. Lessons learned: Anatomy came in useful after all! I knew what the doctors were talking about the whole time! Woo hoo. 8 more years or so and I'll be able to say that about almost any diagnosis. Also, I'm constantly amazed at how much can go wrong with our bodies, especially at no fault of our own! Finally, Radiology has jumped a few spots on my list of possible future careers. It took a CAT Scan to ID the inflamed pancreas... Anyway, she should be just fine from here on out (with regard to this pathology, at least). Hopefully no more hospitalizations until the kids can take care of themselves. The boys were so much fun this week. I wish I could stay at home every day! Have a good weekend, everyone.

BreAnne

I posted this on my blog yesterday, but figured more of you would be reading this one anyway, so here's what I wrote: Most readers know by know that Bre is in the hospital. But in case some details have been lost in translation, and in the interest of keeping everyone consistently up-to-date on her condition, I'll be posting some short notes on how she's doing. We went to the ER Sunday at around 6 p.m. while our wonderful friends David and Megan watched Micah and Asher (who ended up staying the night at their place while we stayed the night in the ER). Bre was diagnosed with pancreatitis, an inflammation of her pancreas. The doctors think the inflammation was caused by backed up pancreatic fluid as a result of an obstruction of her pancreatic duct, which was most likely obstructed by either remnants of gallstones in her common bile duct, or newly precipitated granules that have settled down into the hepatopancreatic ampulla, where the two ducts come together before they go into the duodenum, the short first section of the small intestine after the stomach. In any case, it was a pretty serious inflammation, but it's well under control now. Bre hasn't eaten since Sunday afternoon. They have her on a saline drip to hydrate her, and will be performing a short procedure tomorrow (11th) in which they will guide a small camera and cutting tool down to the opening of the duct into her intestine and cut it, effectively making it larger, allowing the obstruction to pass and pancreatic fluid to resume normal flow. She will (tentatively) be released on Thursday, although a Friday or Saturday release is very possible. The deciding factors are completely subsided pain and inflammation (i.e. not needing pain meds any more) and how well she tolerates food at that point. She spends the day resting and loves visits from the boys, who love visiting her. I miss not having her here, and I wish I could be there during the day (and night) to hang out, but I love having so much time with the boys. It's fun waking up with them, getting them ready for the day, eating with them, playing, and getting them in bed at the end of the day. But they miss their mommy, especially Micah, who keeps asking about her and saying we need to wait for her to eat, bathe, etc. It's sad. She's had a great team of doctors, nurses, and residents taking care of her and she really likes them. They seem to be managing her pain well and keeping her as comfortable as possible.

It Has Been Too Long

 I don't know where to begin because it really is fairly boring. Patrick finished anatomy and started ISP (refer to Patrick's blog for an explanation) November 27th. That was a wonderful day. No more being gone all day long. Now he is home every day by 5:30. It is so nice being able to eat dinner with him and hang out before the boys go to bed. Patrick loves school and has even met a little friend. Said friend's name is Dave. Dave is also doing ISP. Dave has a cool wife, Megan and a cute little boy, Harry. We have had some fun together the past few weeks. It is nice having people to talk with that are in the same place we are.  

 Halloween came and went. We were at the Muhlestein's hanging out and eating all sorts of good food. Crystal, Jordan, and Clara (Dave's brother, sister-in-law, and niece) were also there. Crystal made this really good pumpkin roll. I couldn't stop eating it. Micah and Asher looked adorable in their little puppy costumes. We took them trick-or-treating for a little while. They got quite the load for only going on one street. Every house we went to Micah never forgot to say thank you. What a polite little man. They were quite a hit at all of the houses. I am pretty sure that every one gave them extra candy because, and I quote, "They are so cute". We got to carve pumpkins too (courtesy of Dave and Megan). I have never carved a pumpkin before. Pathetic, I know. I enjoyed the experience immensely. What is also pathetic and well, quite sad is our children have also never carved pumpkins. Why might you ask? I have no idea, this year we kept telling Micah we were going to buy one and carve it or "kill it" like he says (he learned this from "The Great Pumpkin"). For some reason or another we never got around to it. Good thing our friends pulled through for us, thanks guys. Micah took over the job of passing out candy. He was a little slow for the older kids rushing from house to house, but he did a great job and had a lot of fun.   

 Asher took his first step October 28th. Oooohhhhh, that is what I said. It was that cute. He was proud of himself. He is sick of bottles and fights us to take them anymore. Something I am happy about. As I was trying to feed him the other night and I was becoming more and more annoyed at his protests, I realized that he is almost one year old and it wouldn't be the end of the world if he started on whole milk a few weeks early. I am giving it until he finishes off his last can of formula which we opened today.  

 Micah has been drawing a lot of cool pictures lately. He drew his first person a couple of months ago and then this week I found his first drawing of an airplane. I cried. I love finding all of the pictures he draws at the end of the day.