Tuesday, November 5, 2013

echo take 2

Part of the Kawasaki syndromin treatment plan is to have follow up echocardiograms . We had the first one last week. This involved another trip to Helen devos children's hospital.    this also involved the brothers as they were home from school due to the conferences situation.  as you may have expected, none of the adorables were terribly excited at the prospect of driving to gr for a drs appt.

Brad hatched the master plan to reward the babes with a trip to crazy bounce following the hospital.  Everyone was super excited about the crazy bounce portion of the day and promised to be on their best behavior.  their efforts were so preshie. And sometimes absolutely and genuinely helpful.

Maxwell had my phone and was seriously committed to his task of taking some pics of the parking lot  signage so I could relocate the veen after we completed the echocardiogram.  Bear repeatedly shouted,  "o, I hope I'm being good and listening to you mom! I'm trying so hard!" Well, the good news was he really did obey me with a happy heart most of the time. The bad news was that Weston did not recognize his own good behavior.  Hmm.  Ayla asked lots of questions,  and despite my reassuring answers regarding no pokes or hugs, she grew more agitated as we entered the hospital.  I totally don't blame her! Scary memories.

Due to my own panicky planning,  we arrived with plenty of time to spare. Once we were registered and equipped with the correct badges, I strolled the babes to the gift shop to look around and spend some of our extra time. Unfortunately,  we had more time than money,  so some of our extra time was used to explain why I would not be purchasing an $80 stuffed wolf for bear that day. We left without making a purchase,  and ventured upstairs for the main event.

In a determined effort to win the crazy bounce reward,  the brothers were so encouraging to Ayla as we checked in at the cardiologists office.  Everyone was distracted by the puffy stickers available there at the registration desk, so things were off to a happy start. we settled in at a cute little table in the waiting room and I took out the tablet to distract us all.

Didn't take long until our turn came. At the mention of her name, blue became very upset. As in terrified.  I began undressing her for the procedure and the hysterics escalated.  nurse ann seemed overwhelmed by this response despite her career as a pediatric ultrasoundist. finding nemo was playing on the tv, so bear was content watching the show, and occasionally blue would setlle enough to watch some show as well. Whenever nurse ann moved the wand to a new location on Ayla's tiny chest, cupcake would whimper or scream. I laid next to her on the itty bitty cot and tried to comfort the fears and tears. Stressful.

Thankfully, nurse ann determined to wrap things up as quickly as possible, so the echo lasted maybe half an hour. As we were checking out, the boys sneaked some more stickers in their plckets and i bumped into a nurse that previously worked at dr lunds office. Comforting to see a familiar place in that place. 

Soon we were back locked and loaded in the comfort of our messy van. As i started the show, i took a minute to thank god we were finished for now and dealing only with some residual kawasaki symptoms of which he is in total control. A few more deep breaths and i searched for the parking ticket, our way out. Well, bad news. Somehow between ramp 3 and floor 10, i lost that miniscule piece of paper. So i humbly called for help and the attendent graciously allowed me to pass. During our stay at helen devos, brad often struggled with the departure portion of the parking garage area and i would giggle and think that silly. Turns out, it is a real problem for us both. 


The afternoon included craziness and bouncing and exhasution. about a week later, we went back to dr lunds office for a diagnosis of hand foot and mouth disease. during that super fun adventure, we learned that ayla's echo came back completely normal. Praise the lord! We have another echo scheduled for for december. Until then, the aspirin regiment continues. 

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