Recovered!

Sorry to keep you waiting with an update on Ella. She's doing great! Her first couple of days home, she was taking 3-4 hour naps and sleeping 12+ hours at night. Apparently, 2+ years of bad sleep can make you exhausted. Then, she spent a week having nightmares and waking up multiple times a night crying and yelling, "I so tired! I so tired!" As a result, I was so tired, too. So was Travis. So was my sister (who stayed with us for a couple of nights this week and took over "Ella duty" one night). One night, Travis and I switched off answering her cries at 9:30, 11:40, 12:20, 12:30, 12:45, 1:00, 2:20, 5:40 and 6:30. It was so hard on everyone, and it took a while to figure out why it was happening. One night, she kept yelling, "No tiger! No! Tiger go time out!" How scary to be so little and have a bad dream. Apparently, nightmares can be a side effect of anesthesia and surgery. We're so thankful that stage has passed, and Ella is now sleeping great. She breathes very deeply and silently, which is a remarkable improvement from the snoring and grumbling. Praise the Lord!

I also thought I should share more about surgery day, since Ella was pretty cute about the pre-op part. Here she is watching the trains, playing, visiting Pegasus, and meeting the Chipmunks before the action began.

She was so brave as they checked her vitals, all 20.2 pounds and 33 1/2 inches of her. And, she loved the "take your pick" of their stuffed animal box. She chose a teddy bear and appropriately named it, Baylor Bear.

When it was time to change into her hospital gown, she wasn't too sure about it at first. Once we got it on, however, she said, "Look! It's ferfect!" (perfect). She thought her hospital bracelet was "so cute," as well, and proudly showed it to everyone.

To relax her before surgery, they gave her "goofy juice" and the nurses and anesthesiologist couldn't get over how cute and sweet she was in her "first drunk" (doctor's words, not mine). I held her in her hospital bed the whole time until they were ready to take her to surgery. She was so relaxed that she didn't even cry when they took her away. I did.

Luckily, the surgery only lasted about 30 minutes. They removed her tonsils and adenoids, and when her ENT came to get us from the waiting room, he said she was fine, but her tonsils were huge! He continued to stress that, saying that he couldn't believe she could ever eat meat because there was literally no room in her throat to swallow. Poor girl. Travis and I missed an apparently very dramatic part of the day when Ella woke up in recovery. The nurses told us she was MAD. We found her cuddled up with one of the nurses, but she quickly said she wanted her mama. I rocked her to sleep, and we stayed there for about 30 minutes.

Then, we got transferred to her room, and I say we because she wouldn't let me put her down. So, the two of us were cuddled together in her bed and pretty much stayed that way for the next 24 hours. While it was sad to see her upset, I loved having one-on-one snuggle time with her. I loved having her sleep on top of me while I twirled her hair and rubbed her back. She enjoyed four cups of ice cream and two popsicles that first day, but refused to drink anything.

They put a pulse oximeter on her big toe, and it had a red light on it that she was enamored with. She kept telling everyone, "Look! Look at my red toe. See, I have a red light!" Travis left the hospital that evening to take care of Grace and Sutton, so I stayed with Ella. Thankfully, I was able to put on my jammies and brush my teeth before we turned off the lights that night. And then began one of the longest nights ever. Her IV machine alarm kept going off for some reason, and the darn nurses kept coming in every couple of hours to check her blood pressure and temperature. At one point when the nurse had the bp cuff around her leg, Ella sweetly said, "I no want to play doctor anymore." And, each time they'd ask to take her temperature, she'd reply, "No thank you." Even though she charmed the nurses, she did not want to be there. I heard, "Let's go home. I want Ella's room. I need Ella's bed." over and over again. Needless to say, neither one of us got much sleep.

The next day, her doctor said she could go home after she ate something. We tried breakfast, but she wouldn't even eat the chocolate chip pancakes, grapes, or graham crackers she had. So, we laid around that morning, watching television and cuddling. Her lips were terribly dry, so she insisted on applying lots of chapstick.

We tried to get her to eat again at lunch. She ate only a couple of her buttered noodles, and then I did something I probably shouldn't have--I ate the rest of them so we could leave. I just knew that she'd feel better once we got home. After I had my babies, I was just itching to get home so that I wouldn't feel sick anymore. I just don't like hospitals, and neither did Ella.

Once we got home, Ella was pretty subdued. Her voice started to sound funny, but has since gone back to normal. She still wanted her mama a lot, which must be universal. When you're sick, you need your mom, right?

Gracie and Sutton were happy to have her back, and by the end of the weekend, everyone was back in the swing of things. We played lots of dress up and even went to the park.

You can tell a little from this last picture, but Ella lost at least a couple of pounds during the first week post-op. I think she and Sutton weighed the same, and her tiny little clothes were just hanging off of her. She's gained it all back now, I think, and has been eating like a champ. Thank you for all of your prayers!