Still at the hospital

Not that it hasn't been immensely fun to hang out at the pediatric intensive care unit, but after two weeks of hospital-living, I'm starting to get antsy and ready to be released back into the wild. Neither the Bean or I thrive in captivity so I'm fairly certain that she shares my sentiment.

She has been subject to enough torture to develop a distinct dislike for medical professionals, it even humanoids in general, but she still smiles at everyone who shows up at her bedside. Except, at the respiratory therapists when they turn on the nebulizer and she thinks it's the suction machine. Then she starts crying.

While she is smiley and wiggly and friendly and her regular goofball self maneuvering herself into a sideway position in her bed and using her IV hand as a weapon, she's been displaying some strange behaviors that can be attributed to withdrawal from the heavy-duty sedatives and pain-medication. She has a fever and diarrhea, and she is sweating and being very restless and shaky, which are classic withdrawal symptoms. She periodically stiffens up and reacts to some invisible force with either a nervous smile or some frowny whimpering but I think that's due to her horrible diarrhea and diaper rash. The antibiotics turned her poor little garlic-butt into a war-zone.

She is also displaying some major PMS-like behavior with rapid mood swings, going from laughy-smiley to whimpering and crying and I'm guessing that between the withdrawal, the surgery, the exhaustion and the periodic VNS-zaps, her body has no idea what to feel.

Talking about the VNS, Izzy's neurologist came by this afternoon to check on the Bean, and also to let us know (dramatic orchestra music) that the routine EEG showed NO seizures. NONE so the seizures can suck it. I didn't think it appropriate to hug our good doctor, so I only expressed my gleeful excitement verbally.

From a neurological standpoint, Beanie is ready to go home, we just have to have the withdrawal symptoms, the fever and the respiratory infections under control. We are getting there. I think I can see the light at the end of the tunnel, and I think at this time it's not an oncoming train.

P.S. I have been updating my blog from an iPhone app, which means typing with one finger and battling with an over-zealous spell-check that relentlessly changes perfectly correct words into nonsense, making it look like that I am not smarter than a 5th grader. I should have turned it off to show it who is boss, but I rather just appear uneducated. Plus, I'm a foreigner so you can always blame anything nonsensical to my lacking language skills.