We Love Each Other

Happy Little Girl

Happy 4th Birthday!

Gorgeous

Now That Is A Special Delivery!

Rachel and her teacher, Miss Anna

Broken Fibula

Uncle Jimmy, Daddy and Rachel

Rachel 4.0

What a difference two weeks makes! Rachel is no longer gasping in her sleep. Her breathing no longer interrupts her every two minutes. Therefore, she is getting better sleep and is a lot less cranky. That makes her so much more a pleasure to be around.

The ear tubes have improved her hearing too. Her teachers have remarked how much more she pays attention since she can hear better.

Not a day goes by when I can believe just how much I love this child. Every day, Rebecca and I appreciate the gift we received four years and two months ago. She's a daddy's girl and I'm a daughter's dad.

Rachel smiles readily; she sings and she lights up around children younger than her. She doesn't even seem to run around in restaurants anymore. Sometimes she gets up abruptly and walks away, but that's usually a signal she is bathroom-bound.

So, who is Rachel at age four? She likes pink, the Wiggles, going to the mall and jumping on the images beamed down from a projection screen on the roof, chocolate, lip gloss, Cody in her class, play ball, playing on the computer, drawing, riding her trike, the Ed, Edd and Eddy cartoon (which mommy and daddy think is too violent) and the Fairly Oddparents (which we find fairly funny.) She is also a big fan of tilapia, black beans and rice, raw carrots, french fries and corn on the cob (until it gets stuck in her teeth.)

She is afraid of violent scenes on tv (like that sensitivity!), thunderstorms, fire, air-powered hand driers, toilets that flush themselves and being out of sight of mommy and daddy.

Unfortunately, she doesn't like it when daddy tries to change the lyrics of her favorite songs to put her in it. "No, those are not the words!" she howls. She tends to want to hear her cd cuts in the proper numerical order. And heaven forbid if you turn off the car ignition in the middle of one of her favorite songs. "You ruined it!" she will lament. Still has a bit/lot of drama queen in her.

She still has a tremendous capacity to make me laugh. Her mother sang with the Temple choir Saturday and I came to pick Rachel up before the service. She asked why she couldn't watch her mommy sing. I told her she was too young and she asked earnestly, "I have to be 45?" I said, "Well, maybe not 45. Maybe when you're a teenager."

She is also asserting her independence. The other day she told me, "I don't need you," and told me to stand outside the bathroom stall while she did her business. Then I heard a very mature four-year-old add, "Actually, I do need you..." as the stall door opened.

I can't wait for what's next.

Rachel's Recovery

The pre-op and the op were a breeze compared with the post-op. One of our instructions was to try to prevent Rachel from jumping and running around. The basic response to that was, "Have you seen our child? Nonetheless, we pledged to give it the ole college try. And actually, she's only turned one front somersault without us stopping it in time.

We thought we'd come home and she'd be listless. Not our child! It was obvious she had been through trauma, but you can't keep an energetic child down.

She wanted no part of any Gatorade, but was willing to drink as much apple juice as provided. An early diet of vanilla ice cream would turn into a demand for chocolate within a few days.

And it's nice to know that she listened to us, even if she didn't always acknowledge it. Rachel wanted to know why it was suddenly acceptable to eat "treats" for breakfast.

Speaking of ice cream and milk products, Rachel milked her recovery when possible. She'd be a step from a roll of toilet paper or a box of kleenex and she'd whine/grunt (whunt?) and point to it with an expression like "You don't possibly expect me to expend the energy to walk all the way over there to pick that up, do you?"

But by far, the biggest joy (not!) was the daily dispensing of the medication.

First, there was the pain medication in the red plastic bottle. The bottle was the same color as the anesthesia that Rachel took before she went under. She eyed it suspiciously. The liquid inside it was more a yellowish tint. She offered the least resistance taking this one.

Then there was the milky white antibiotic. It was a tablespoon and a half through a dropper every 12 hours. The stuff was so thick, you could never be sure there was enough in the dropper when you'd administer the second half of the dose. Rachel wanted no part of it. At first, she refused to swallow, letting it dribble down her chin. Then she'd try to run away. You'd grab at her panties, and it would look like the old Coppertone billboard where the black dog is pulling down the little girl's bathing suit bottom. If Rachel did get away, she'd go into the classic duck and cover pose, hunched over with her face pressed against the floor.

But by far, the biggest pain in the, well, ears, were her ear drops. For three days, we had to drip five drops into the ear canals of both ears two times a day. All I can say is, you never can find a lasso when you truly need one! I might as well have been calf roping my kid. As she screamed, bargained and negotiated, it was obvious this was a two-person operation. One person would have to grab her and twist her to her side enough for the other to deliver the drops.

I quickly learned that with the ear drops and antibiotic, it was important to pin the legs as well as grab the arms. This became obvious after legs coiled in a fetal position launched a well-placed foot into daddy's throat a couple of times.

You had to ignore the accusatory finger and angry declarations of "I don't need you!" You had to realize that even as she exclaimed, "I don't need you!" she was still following you all over the house. And when calm returned to her sweet, pale visage, it was comforting to hear her say, "I'm sorry I kicked you, daddy. I was scared."

By the end of the week, we'd negotiate it. "Take this medicince and then sip some apple juice." Or "If you take this and don't complain, we'll call your school and let you talk to your friends."

That was a good one. We called the school and her teacher put Rachel's boyfriend, Cody on the phone. It was like listening to trains traveling down parallel tracks, but never intersecting.

"Cody, I had a surgery."

"I have paneut butter in my lunch today."

So here's the good news. Rachel never coughed up any blood, as we were told might happen. She doesn't gasp in her sleep anymore. In fact, we have to walk in to see if she's okay, she's so quiet. She wakes up in the best mood since she was born, because her tonsils are no longer there to cause obstructive sleep apnea and interrupt her breathing every two minutes. Her nose has stopped running incessantly. The ear tubes must be working, because she hasn't asked us once to turn up the tv, which used to be a constant request. We went to a hockey game and she remarked how loud it was.

We haven't run out of Gatorade or vanilla ice cream. It sure tastes good, but not as good as a healthy little girl who breathes and hears better.

Rachel's Surgery

After months of gasping in her sleep and urging us to turn up the volume on the tv or radio, the day of Rachel's operation had arrived. The tonsils and adenoids would come out; the ear tubes would go in.

We arrived at the outpatient care center an hour ahead of time as instructed. In a matter of minutes, we were ushered into a bright waiting room after a detour to retrieve Rachel from the vending machine room (she hadn't been allowed to eat since midnight the night before.)

A cheerful nurse in blue scrubs came in and put everyone at ease. She explained procedures at length to Rachel, who had repeatedly exclaimed, "Owee!" the previous week when a blood count was taken from her arm. She was also wary of the blood pressure cuff squeezing her arm like a cobra. But this nurse was patient, had a soothing voice and engaged Rachel in conversation.

She even brought Rachel a teddy bear to take with her. We nicknamed it Glancy, since the procedure would be performed at the former Joan Glancy Hospital. Glancy took the place of Minnie Mouse, who had accompanied Rachel to the hospital.

At one point, the nurse accompanied Rachel down the hall when I heard the sound of little sneakers coming to a screeching halt. Rachel had been spooked by other nurses and doctors in their surgical caps, wanted no part of it and came running back to the security of mommy and daddy.

When the anesthesiologist came in to explain his role in the surgery, Rachel saw his green scrubs, started bawling and buried her head in my armpit, emerging periodically to look at the anesthesiologist and crying anew when she saw he was still there.

My wife reacts badly to anesthesia, so the decision was made to give Rachel oral anesthesia rather than anesthesia through a mask. The week before, Rachel had been told she'd breathe through a mask shaped like a banana or a strawberry and she replied earnestly, "Are you going to take the seeds out? I don't like the seeds."

So, she took the oral anesthesia. It was red and apparently didn't taste very good. We were told to not let her walk around on her own, because she could fall.
About ten or fifteen minutes later, while in my lap, Rachel tilted back her head, looked at me and giggled goofily. It was obvious she was aware of her surroundings, but it was also clear the anesthesia was taking effect.

A short time later, they brought in a plastic wagon with a sheet on it and a propped up pillow and a warmed blanket on top of it. Rachel was lifted into the wagon and I gave her a ride up and down the hall. She was beginning to look more stoned than amused.

After ten minutes, a team of nurses said they would take it from there and pulled the wagon through some doors before turning left to the operating room. When the wagon disappeared from view, the reality hit that Rachel was about to undergo her first operation. Rebecca burst into heaving sobs and I struggled to keep my Adam's Apple from leaping out my mouth.

We were ushered back to the prep room, reassured everything would be okay and taken to another room to await our meeting with Dr. Plotnick post-surgery.

The operation was supposed to take thirty minutes. In reality, it was an hour and fifteen minutes to an hour and a half before the doctor emerged. In that interim, Rebecca and I talked about what was happening. Rebecca wondered whether something went wrong. I figured Rachel was her feisty self and struggled not to "go down."

It turns out there was nothing to worry about. The tonsils and adenoids were huge. There was a large amount of mucus behind her eardrums, as well as swelling. But Rachel came out like a champ and would be ushered to recovery shortly.

We decided to grab a quick bite. We didn't want to eat in front of her. About the time we came back, she had just been wheeled into post-op.

We were told we'd probably hear her wailing and did we ever! She was one ticked-off four-year-old. It didn't matter whether her throat hurt; her lungs worked just fine. It was the deep, almost possessed tone of one angry child. A brown bandage was wrapped around her left hand. She had no need for a grape popsicle offered to her. Rebecca lay down with her and she barked, "No! Daddy!" So I tried to soothe her and she fell asleep with her head rested on my chest. It was one of the most gratifying feelings of my life. The bond of love between daughter and parent is better than just about any high I could imagine.

She'd awaken occasionally to fuss about the monitoring device on her toe. Mostly she slept, with Glancy beside us with a fake line taped to his hand to feed him fluids as well. After they took off the bandage and the monitor on her leg, it was time to go home.

The surgery was over. The post-op fun was about to begin.