Going home!

Wednesday, January 22
This morning I rushed through my shower, because I saw the neonatology team on rounds one hall down from us while I was on my way there, and I wanted to make sure I was in the room when they came by. I got back to the room just as they got there to talk about the baby next door, and then it was time for them to talk about Faith. They said they were excited to talk about her, because she is doing so well. They said that she would be coming off the TPN today, and that one of the GI docs was supposed to come by, because we will be following up with them for Faith's cholestasis. Then they asked if we have a pediatrician at home, so I gave them Dr. Albritton's number, and they are going to call her and make sure she's comfortable taking Faith as a patient. I hope she is, because I already called this morning and scheduled her an appointment!
Last night they drew a bunch of labs, which required doing a vein stick (in her head, because she wouldn't bleed from her arm) and temporarily putting in a catheter to get a urine sample. Faith's Broviac line isn't drawing for blood anymore, for some reason, even though it flushes fine, so that's why they had to poke her. Then today she had an abdominal ultrasound. The GI docs just want to rule out anything else potentially causing the cholestasis, and have a baseline to go by for when they see her down the road.
Yesterday was the last time that we'll have Jan as a nurse. She's on vacation now and won't be back until after we go home, so I made sure to get a picture of her with Faith to put in Faith's scrapbook. (I promised her I wouldn't post it on the blog though!) I am going to try to get pictures of Faith with each of her primary nurses before we leave to go home, I think that will make a really nice page in her book.
So, I asked the neonatology team this morning when they thought we could go home. They said probably Monday. Whatever day we go home will be a great day for us, but Monday actually isn't a good day for us to leave, because Dave is going to be enlisting in the National Guard on Monday, so I told Dr. Sandoval that when he came by this afternoon, and asked if we couldn't go home this weekend instead. He said Saturday would be good for the surgeons, and I said Saturday would be great for us, so then he went and talked to neonatology, and they agreed! So, unless anything unexpected happens, we will be going home on Saturday!
Dave is coming down Friday night and we will make sure that everything that needs to be done for us to leave gets done, so we can get out of here as early as possible on Saturday. Faith will have to spend an hour in her carseat, we will have to watch some videos on stuff like infant CPR, and we'll have to learn about her meds, since we'll be giving them at home. She is on Lansoprazole (Prevacid) and Ursodiol, which is supposed to help the cholestasis. And she will be on a fat-soluble ADEK vitamin supplement, also for the cholestasis.
I can't believe after all of this, we are finally going to go home!! Tomorrow will be 10 weeks, so when we go home it will be day 72... we'll definitely have a story to tell for awhile!