Shiny

This morning, after everyone managed to get in a decent amount of sleep to combat whatever ailed them, we awoke to some good news.  His ANC is back up, to 128, and our nurse has tentatively said that we're scheduled to be discharged tomorrow.  Now, we'll see if his doctor will still want us to leave if his numbers aren't high enough but it is good news nonetheless.  His hemoglobin dipped this morning, so we are in the process of pre-medicating him before pumping more sanguine succor into his veins.  This, hopefully, will also put a bit more spring in his... well, standing still on hands and knees, so it should help with his brief respite back into the real world where the trees are made of lollipops, the rivers flow with chocolate, and the only people wearing nurse's outfits are those with predisposed fetishes.

Today is also the first that Shay and I will be changing his dressing protecting the insertion point of his broviac tube.  We watched a few of his previous changes and have since practiced on a disembodied chest several times.  We're fairly confident in our ability not to screw this up, as the chest piece has yet to develop an infection or die from massive blood loss or trauma.  With our impeccable record bespeaking our growth as medical professionals via osmosis, today should be a piece of cake.  Also, we will be surrounded by a flock of techs and nurses who, at a moments notice, will swoop in, taze the pair of us, and ensure that the job is done right.  I must say, I'm looking forward to it; I've never been tazed before.

In all seriousness, of which there should be some instances, it will be a good experience for us.  Not just because we will need to know how to do it just in case the sterilization of the entry point becomes compromised while we are out of the hospital.  But it also affords Shay and I an opportunity to do something that we haven't had much of in the recent past: we get to be directly involved in the treatment and care of Jayne.  I'm not implying that we haven't done everything we could to take care of Jayne while we've been in the hospital. We do all of the things we've done since the day he was born, we feed him, change him, entertain him, keep him from the various attempts he's made on his own life, and generally help him develop into human being.  We haven't been able to much more than that, however, to aid him in his battle against cancer.  We occasionally administer oral medicine and we keep an eye on him and any side effects he might start presenting him.  Now we have an opportunity to actually have a hand in something other than what they would allow a young helper wearing a football helmet.  It isn't much, and it will give him more discomfort than anything else, but it will help keep him healthy.  It is one more thing that we did for Jayne, with our own, trembling gloved hands.  I don't expect that there can be much more that we can do; we can't give him an X-ray, EKG, fix his IV, administer chemo, test his blood, or really anything else that requires 8 years of schooling to even think about doing.

In the end, though, the family which prevents horrible, debilitating infections together is the family which grows together.  Free of horrible, debilitating infections.