Pain Is Scary

We successfully got through his last night of multiple injections with nary an issue.  He slept peacefully again with the lack of his nap earlier that day and the dose of Benadryl working well on his disposition.  With the new day came a new nurse and pct ready and willing to become enamored in our debonair, nearly bald lad.  Also, today marks the day that he was to get his broviac dressing changed for the first time.  As you might well guess, there was a feeling of trepidation at this from the nursing staff; most children don't react well to their first or even their fifth changing of the gauze.  So, with a promise of flashing noise makers and an extra pair of hands, we set out on a bold new task.

We surrounded his bed, donned our masks, and, as the nurses began to work at dissolving the adhesives holding his dressing in place, I held his feet and he held onto my finger.  To distract him, as most children need, Shay was holding several colorful noise makers, filled with colorful balls and shiny beads, and one ray blaster.  With the cacophony of light and sound making coherent thought a distant memory, they begun peeling away the dressing.  It seemed like a bad acid trip shared by Jackson Pollock and Andy Worhol.  Indeed, if Jayne ever does mushrooms in his life, or any other hallucinogenic drug, I'm sure that the buried memory of this experience will rear it's multicolored head and vomit forth the demonic pitter patter of a rain stick mating with a space laser.  I already anticipate a phone call at two in the morning 18 to 20 years from now regarding this very eventuality. 

With the assault on two of our five senses complete, it was time for a third, our noses, to feel a bit of persecution.  And, with a nose as sizable as my own, this was no small ordeal.  When the dressing was off and discarded, the area around the tube and incision into Jayne's chest needed to be clean.  I'm not sure what the substance was but I'm fairly convinced it was created in a small shack up in the mountains and delivered by an older man driving a stock car.  For those of you who don't know the origins of NASCAR, this is reference to the fact that this cleaning solution brought to my mind very vivid, and yet muddy, memories of my first encounter with moonshine.

Despite all this, he was a rock star, paying very little heed to noise makers and glowing lights except for the cursory glances of a baby trying to take in all of his surroundings for later cataloging. He didn't flinch in pain, he didn't scream or cry or show any hint of fear.  He watched us all in turn, held onto my finger, and treated it like another day at the office.  Sadly, it will become an event he is all too familiar with, as this process needs to be repeated every week.  Again, the nurses were impressed by the boy they call Jayne, commenting that it was the best reaction they'd seen a child have.  I'm sure some of the was positive reinforcement for Shay and I, not to mention a bit of a stroke on our egos (we are both responsible for producing precisely one half of him).  I don't hold that against them; with a tyke who needs very little consoling and coddling (except when his aunt is around, then all he get's is mollycoddling), I imagine the nurses feel a bit unfilled in their jobs and so must find someone to reassure.

We've crested the first ridge and the straightaway is in sight.  We don't know how long we'll be in this cramped room but not long enough for them to have required the walls to be padded.  Best guess is that we'll be able to take him out of the hospital in ten days or so, but it's really contingent upon Jayne's biology and genetics.  Thankfully, we saw that he was well-suited for the task, as his genes are impeccable.

Thank you, everyone, one and all: our families and friends, who are constant in their support, the nurses who fawn over our baby, the techs whose due diligence keeps us comfortable and informed, and the doctors who are doing everything they can to ensure that Jayne does one day call me at two a.m. after reliving this experience.  We love you all for loving our sweet boy.