Back to no sleeping...

Right now Ellie is sitting in bed, head bandage a bit caddy whompus after 4 days, giant calendula in her nose (that's the oxygen tube), with huge bags under her eyes.  Her face did not swell as much this time.  But she is so tired that she looks sort of haunted.  Lots of staring spells.  It is hard for her to sleep as every few minutes someone comes into the room.  Sort of to be expected after a holiday weekend.  Even a fly just flew into the room.  And if not a person coming into her room, there seems to be lots of beeping from her monitors/IVs.  Ellie keeps telling me that she feels yucky, that her stomach hurts.  Dr. Iskandar said that may be due to air bubbles in her brain from when he took out the cysts.  Respiratory therapy says it may be from the breathing/coughing treatments putting air into her stomach (yet another reason these breathing treatments are my nemesis right now).  I really don't care why her stomach is hurting, I would just very much like it to not be hurting any more.  Ever.  Ugh I hate feeling nauseated.  And nauseated with a headache.  Total bummer.   These freakin' breathing treatments are bumming me out.  I know I was going to think of better feeling thoughts about that, but I'm not quite there yet.  They so make her gag and stress her (and me) out.  Seriously I have never seen a fly in the hospital before, and now there is one zooming around our room.  Weird. 

We have had the greatest nurses this time.  Ones who are kind and smart and patient.  Just the best.  That certainly makes the day go much more smoothly.   I told our nurse yesterday how whenever Ellie is uncomfortable/in pain/nauseated, in my head I become Carol Burnette in that episode of Mad About Youwhen she played Helen Hunt's mom while Helen Hunt was giving birth.  Carol Burnette freaked out about her daughter being in pain, as only Carol Burnette can.  So all day, if Ellie seemed uncomfortable, we would say, "We don't want Carol to come out!"   

Ben is on a playdate with his friend Caitlyn (and her mom Cynthia) this morning.  He was super excited to see her again and kept asking me when he could go on another playdate.  He also asked me when we could stop going to the hospital last night.  I told him not tomorrow, but sometime soon.  Guess he's getting a little tired of all the hospital stuff too.  Great big thanks to Cynthia to agreeing to a playdate even on a day that is already busy.  (Cynthia sent me an adorable photo of Ben and Caitlyn on a previous playdate.  I cannot seem to locate them, unfortunately.  Cynthia, could you please re-send them to me so I could post them?  Cynthia is super organized, so I am confident she will be able to find said photos.  But "watch out" as Ellie would say, Ben and Caitlyn together is extremely cute...)