The Days Are Just Packed

It's funny how exhausted I am when you consider how I spend my days. I mean, when I'm at the hospital I spend all Benjamin's awake time trying to keep him stimulated, entertained and happy while simultaneously confining him to his crib or a 4'x4' foam mat on the floor. Should be a piece of cake, no? No.

As you can see, except for the feeding tube Benjamin does not look sick - and that came out this morning. He's eating real food again, although we're still working on the bottles of formula. His blood counts are already coming up again, and he stopped shedding. The chemo seems to have left his system. Which means that Benjamin is an essentially healthy boy (he's still very susceptible to infections) who's getting healthier by the day - and thus harder to control. I can't wait until they tell me that we can leave the room, even if it's just to go down the hall to the playroom. Hopefully that day will be very soon. At least when we're allowed out of his room, I can put him in the stroller and interact with some of the other "inmates". There are at least 3 other moms that I recognize from our last visit in June. Some families, like us, went home for a while and came back. Others haven't left yet. And we're all waiting, but we make the best of it. One older patient made cupcakes for everyone in the ward yesterday (Benjamin loved his). Once a week there's free cookies and coffee. And the parents with babies or toddlers in isolation (there's at least 3 of us) sneak out of their rooms when they can to gossip, check e-mail, eat, shower, do laundry, etc. while the children nap.

See, this forced isolation of Benjamin also becomes a forced isolation of his keeper. When he's awake we can't just leave him for 30 minutes to eat or take a shower. And eating in front of him is torture for both of us, because no matter what I'm eating and how wildly inappropriate it is for a baby's system, he wants some. (Have I mentioned Benjamin got his voice back?) I've started hoping that he naps around lunch and dinner, just so I can eat at somewhat normal times. And if I thought showers were a luxury before....

But that's all just whining and griping. The important thing is that Benjamin is getting better. And the faster he gets better, the faster they can start the next round of chemo, and we'll be that much closer to putting this all behind us. Now if I could just teach him how to use the PlayStation....