Now that we’ve been home for a few days it was time to get back to our real lives. I had the pleasure of paying bills, cleaning my messy bedroom/office, doing laundry, etc. And for all that hard work, I treated myself to getting my hair done and a little shopping (I needed a new pair of jeans that fit since I lost 10lbs!). My sister watched Kennedy today while I had my hair cut and colored. Many thanks to Kim for only charging me for the cut! Then I decided to go to Old Navy and find a pair of jeans and walked to Borders and got Keith a new Thomas Guide of the NW for work. Not exciting but a big treat for me. If that wasn’t enough, Caryn made me yummy Chinese chicken salad for lunch! The only thing that could have made it better would have been a nice, long nap.
Austin returned to school today-finally. He’s still coughing a lot but at least we can manage it now. As he has gotten older, his asthma attacks have been less frequent but more severe. Please continue to pray for him; he has missed so much school this year. We did get his report card today and it was fantastic despite his frequent absences. He earned all A’s and B’s and even brought some B’s up to A’s this past quarter. We are so proud of his achievements! He is such a wonderful brother-always getting Kennedy water, toys, diapers and helping with her medicine or entertaining her in the hospital. It is easy to forget the silent survivors in this-the siblings. Many times his needs are moved to the way side because hers are so demanding. He spent his birthday and Christmas Break either with friends and family or in the hospital. He has spent a lot of weekends there or at home because we couldn’t go anywhere. He has struggled to eat dinner while his sister is losing hers and been woke up in the night because her bed had to be changed. He’s been asked to retrieve clean clothes, towels, diapers and wipes, medicines and blankets. He has spent late nights in the ER or in the hospital room. He has spent days away from his mommy and dad. He has had to learn lots of new medical terms and explain them to everyone-family, friends and strangers. He has cleaned up puke in the car and held the bowl for his sister. He shaved his head and had to explain to all of his friends why. He has had to worry about his sister dying and wondered if his parents were losing their minds. He’s been taken to baseball and soccer games by his friends and grandparents and hoped his mom and dad could show up. He even missed out on a birthday party because people had colds or coughs and could not be around Kennedy. He’s gotten to know every inch of the 3rd floor at Emanuel and pulled the wagon around and around more times than he can count. He has pushed the wheelchair and stroller to the clinic, carried the diaper bag, been forced to watch princess movies over and over and over, and played with his sister to coax her in to doing her exercises for physical, occupational and speech therapy. Tonight, Austin is my hero. I couldn’t be more proud of my little boy. Thank you to everyone who has taken the extra time to send him cards, encouraged him, spent time with him, taken him fun places or had him overnight to distract him and notice how important he is in all of this. It means the world to all of us.
Kennedy has been doing very well. She is not only tolerating her feeds through her NG tube, but she is eating as much as we can give her. She has even began asking to use the potty instead of her diaper! Yeah for Mommy!!! I would guess that her counts are recovering as she looks great. She is walking but has a very awkward gait so we’ll see what Amy has to say tomorrow. We are looking forward to seeing Kaitlin and dropping in on Rebekah and her mommy. She is scheduled for chemo so we’ll see how that goes. I’ll be updating soon on how things went.
Sometimes being a brother is even better than being a superhero. ~Marc Brown
Love-Hope-Faith
Melenie
