Harlie's Home!

Well, my family of four now officially lives in the same house! On Wednesday morning, all the supplies and equipment was delivered. It was crazy. It took us a long time to get everything organized. I think we were trained on all the equipment in a few hours. They had to go and get oxygen because the hospital called to say that she was back on oxygen. Luckily, they seemed to wean her off the oxygen by Thursday. Hopefully, we won't need to put her back on. On Wednesday night we roomed in at the NICU. It was crazy. Their monitors were going off every two seconds, keeping us from ever getting any sleep. Harlie was fine, their monitors are just hyper-sensitive. They gave her the hour car seat test and she passed with flying colors. Then on Thursday we started all the discharge stuff, CPR, paperwork, last minute questions, etc. We had the best nurse ever and she hooked us up and kept things streamlined so we could get on the road before traffic. We definitely did not want to have her in the car for 3+ hours. We had her baptized at 1pm. And then we said our goodbyes to everyone and were in the car at 2pm. It was weird to leave. On one hand it was so nice to know that I didn't have to drive back anytime soon. And it is not easy to be at a children's hospital everyday. The things you see are not good. It is very hard to see so many children not healthy - and to see their parents. I think we all have the same look to us. But then on the other hand, it was hard to leave the shelter of the hospital. Everyone there has seen far worse and Harlie's issues are nothing to them. She's just another baby that they need to help. Now, we enter the real world with people that have never seen a baby with a trache (just like we were) or one that looks like her. And that is pretty scary. Last night went well. She slept soundly between feedings. It takes 2 of us to take care of her right now. Hopefully, soon we get good enough to do some of her stuff solo so Tom can sleep since he has to go to work. I'll just have to learn to take naps during the day when she sleeps. That shouldn't be that hard - haha. Well, we have our first outing in a few hours - to the pediatrician's office. We'll see how that goes. It is safe to say that we will not be traveling light for quite a while. I am definitely not going anywhere alone with Harlie for a while! Well, we have to get going. Thanks for checking in and thanks for thinking of us. I'll have more medical info for you soon (hopefully by Monday morning). Talk to you soon,Christy