Welcome to my blog. I write about life as a Christian wife, mother of eight children, and grandmother.
Enjoy.
St. Louis. One full week. Full of Pottery and Jumbo Marshmallows. Best time ever! Never before have I watched Sound Of Music sitting on a bed with a huge soda in hand. I don't think I will ever forget my time in St. Louis.
In 2009 we added a six hundred square foot addition on our home. Rich's mother had just passed away and while neither of us had strong opinions on having our parents live with us, neither of us wanted his father grieving alone. We offered space and assisted living type support in our home. Grandpa accepted.
Working on Grandpa's new room was all our family did that summer. A son moved back from Florida to participate in the construction. A future son-in-law proved his loyalty with long days of concrete work. Our then ten-, fourteen-, fifteen-, and sixteen-year-old sons grew up quickly. We swung sledgehammers, lifted walls, reached for roof trusses, set windows, ran electrical lines and hung drywall. It was a labor of love and changed us. As a family and individuals. The construction project set pieces of Grandpa's heart right again as he was drawn out of his grief and into meaningful work and something bigger than than himself - the power of a family working together.
I am amazed how many people follow Nathaniel's and our family's story. Almost weekly at church someone we don't know will approach and want an update. Last night I realized I have this "other" category for Facebook messages. I am not sure why some messages go to my inbox and some to other. (If you know why, please tell me in the comment section below!) There were over twenty messages waiting in that other folder, some dated back to April in Nathaniel had hand surgery; all of them notes of encouragement, prayer, and kind words about sharing Nathaniel's story through this blog. They made me cry. You are all so genuine and so faithful to show support. Thank you for reading. Thank you for liking Facebook posts. For letting us know you are praying. It makes a difference.
Three times it happened during Nathaniel's recent hospitalization.
"He's in here with Grandma," said the Emergency Room attending to the resident as they discussed Nathaniel's case outside the partially opened thick sliding glass door.
"Are you hanging out with Grandma, today?" the respiratory therapist asked Nathaniel when she came into his room to administer a treatment.
"Grandma, will you be staying the night instead of Mom?" asked a night nurse new to Nathaniel's case just after shift change.
"I'm Mom," I replied.
Once I added a smack, "A twenty-something Mom or Dad couldn't handle this kid."
I mentioned in my last post that for almost two years, we have used the majority of our private duty nursing hours for overnights. Life with private duty nursing has been quite the journey. Night nursing? A whole different ball game in itself. We have had twenty-nine nurses. I have caught seventeen different nurses sleeping; they were immediately removed from Nathaniel's case. A handful of nurses that worked well for us either moved out of town or faced some other personal life change that caused them to leave our job and home health. Another small handful of nurses were skilled, but just not the right fit for us. Non-nursing issues, like a nurse's clothing and belongings smelling like cigarette smoke, can become intolerable when the workplace is our private home.
For all our struggle with finding night nurses, we have had the opposite experience with day nurses. Nathaniel has had just a few since coming home.
Our night nurse arrived at ten last night and we were in bed by 10:25 pm. She left at eight this morning. We crawled out of bed at 7:36 am. Nine hours of sleep. Rich and I both needed it. Nine hours is a good night of sleep for parents of a two year old. It is a very good, rarely experienced night sleep for parents of a trached two year old. It means everything that possibly could have gone wrong went right instead. It means a nurse was on duty. It means the room air compressor, oxygen concentrator, pulse oximetry, heated humidity, and feeding pump - the machines Nathaniel requires at night - worked properly. It means Nathaniel settled back into sleep with a few pats on the bottom or by repositioning himself after waking. It means the night went as we had planned and prayed.
We plan to hibernate on Friday nights weekly.
