Squirrelicious and Moose-a-yummy

There is only one sign that Bridget is sick:  She sleeps 12+ hours at night and still takes a nap.  This is a child for whom sleep is an evil enemy and the only sign that she is sleeping is that she is not talking.  And when she hears any movement at night or in the morning she bolts out of bed.  So sitting by her bed while she is still sleeping 12 hours after we went to bed, it is the only sign I see of her being sick.

Again, every medical professional who sees her starts the conversation with "She just looks so healthy!  She has so much energy!  She is so adorable/cute/funny/sweet/precious, I want to eat her up!"  OK, so I added that last part.  But she is a very healthy, pink squirrelly girl with crappy ass lungs that have almost sent her to the PICU for the second time in 2 months.  The nurse let that slip today and I had a semi-freak out.

Blergh.

In better news, we had the twins' birthday celebration here yesterday.  Can I let the love for my son, my moose-a-yummy, shoot out of my heart right now? Well, I'm going to anyway.  This clever, sensitive boy was so focused on his sister yesterday.  On *HIS* birthday!! What empathetic skills this child shows.  When Dave showed up with a surprise bag of presents before our pizza party birthday celebration, Christopher insisted they were all for Bridget.  We had to convince them that they were for him, too.  (We are going to have another welcome home/birthday party with a few more presents when B gets home.  Plus the "kid party" later on. C had his party at daycare yesterday and B will have hers at daycare next week.)

In any case, we had a fine birthday celebration with the twins with pizza, presents, and cupcakes generously sent to us from our niece, Elyse.  We are saving the cake the hospital sent us for today. Yes, the staff here at Hemby has been AMAZING for Bridget to make her birthday special.  Every single staff member from the janitorial to the nutrition to the RTs to the Nurses to the CNAs to the ER doctor to the Child Life specialist to the volunteers brought a little something (and sometimes a very big something) for Bridget yesterday.  Everyone wanted to make it special for her.  Thank you, Hemby Children's Hospital.

They even moved us from a tiny room to a jumbo family room (they have quite a few of them here) with enough space for the whole family to be here and move around.

Our pediatrician came by this morning. Love her as she called us yesterday on her day off (and now I have her cell phone number--evil laugh--bwahahahahha) to check on Bridge. Our ped is going to start looking for underlying causes to being in the hospital and nearly in PICU twice in 2 months. The good news is a congenital heart problem is ruled out from her NICU EKGs. We tried to do a cystic fibrosis test this afternoon, but didn't get enough sweat.  We'll have to see if they repeat that. Fortunately, both Dave and I have tested negative for cystic fibrosis.  It's still possible that Bridget got it from a genetic mutation on her own, but we kissed and licked her and she didn't taste salty.  She certainly tastes like she could have a bath, but she's not salty (a strong common cystic fibrosis sign, says Dr. Google)

There are not a lot of other things it could be.  But two visits to the hospital for multiple days including  PICU is bothersome.