Training

Ali called me this morning around 8:00 and was flustered. The charge nurse reserved a room at the hospital for tonight and wanted us to stay with Brady. They had placed us into three classes to teach us how to use the G-J tube, the feeding pump and other items for bringing Brady home.

Ali tried to explain to her that we needed to talk as a family before we could commit to anything. We need to schedule around two kids at home, work schedules, grandparents' schedules, Ali's previously scheduled doctors appointments, etc. I called one of the nurses and explained that we really needed more time before we could schedule anything.

When we initially talked about the the G-J surgery, the nurses told us it would take around a week before Brady would come home. Brady still is on heavy pain medication, isn't eating his food, hasn't had a bowel movement, and doesn't seem to us like he's ready to come home.

Ali spent the entire day holding Brady. They removed the IV from his hand and are now giving him his pain medication (morphine and Tylenol) orally. Brady drank 10 ml from a bottle at one point. He still looks very sleepy. The nurses and doctors feel like he is healing very well.

The charge nurse visited Ali four or five times during the day and tried to keep scheduling classes. Ali tried communicating with me, but Wednesdays are extremely busy at school, and I didn't have time to get back to her. When I arrived at the hospital around 4:00, Ali looked exhausted.

Brady's nurse at the time (Cathy) was extremely kind. She explained to us that the charge nurse tries to fill schedules. There was a hospital room available, so wanted to reserve it for us. The same was true for open class times. Cathy told us that we shouldn't feel pressured. We can back out of anything scheduled at the last minute without any problems.

Cathy spent some time explaining the G-J tube to us. Both Ali and I connected and disconnected the tubes on Brady and had some of our questions answered. She also walked us down to see one of the hospital boarding rooms in the NICU. Brady will be able to sleep with us in the room and will be disconnected from all equipment. The same nurses from the NICU are available to assist us at all times in our room. Seeing the room really reduced some of our anxiety about our overnight stay.

Ali and I asked to move the room reservation to tomorrow night. They did that for us and changed our training times accordingly. We will be trained on the G-J tube at 4:00 p.m. and trained on the feeding pump at 5:00 p.m. We will stay overnight in the room with Brady and practice caring for him. At 9:00 a.m. on Friday we will have more training (Danny sling, reflux training, CPR, etc.).

Grandma Marie will start off watching the kids tomorrow. She will then pass them off to Grandma Rita to spend the night with them at our house and get Ava off to school on Friday.

Ali also goes to the doctor at 1:30 for another incision check. It seems to be fully healed now, but it will be nice to hear what the doctors say.

We really don't know what to expect tomorrow or in the days to come. We hope that Brady is acting more like a baby, so we can practice what it will be like to care for him at home.

With love,

Tyler, Ali, Ava, Casey and Brady