8/26/06
11:45 PM: I'm having trouble going to sleep, so I thought I'd post a quick update for those of you who are checking in over the weekend. Today was a much better day than yesterday. Honestly, yesterday was a really hard day for us. Seeing Sophie screaming (several times) wasn't easy. I kept telling myself it could be so much worse (because she's really fine--we could be facing much worse things), but it was very hard in the moment.
Dealing with the PICC line isn't nearly as easy (or as similar, at least) as we thought it would be. Sophie is very protective of that whole arm, so she really doesn't like us fiddling with it for any reason. She gets very upset when we flush the line with saline (which we have to do before and after we administer the antibiotic). It's room temperature, but she says it's cold and it hurts. We've tried warming it in hot water, which seems to help, but putting the syringe in water (even if we clean it with alcohol) can introduce bacteria. We came up with a way to warm most of the syringe without getting the tip of it in the water, so I think we'll be fine. Interestingly, when we do it at night while she's asleep, it doesn't bother her at all. She wakes up, but she doesn't complain.
For much of the day, she seemed pretty uncomfortable. She was tired, fussy, and not very hungry. She was especially unhappy when we had to unwrap the pressure bandange to make sure everything looked okay under the dressing. After she complained of it hurting, we decided to go ahead and try the tylenol with codeine, and it seemed to make a huge difference. Although she was still protective of the arm, she never complained of it hurting again, and she seemed a lot happier. She rode her tricyle (one-handed) outside tonight and went to bed easily. It was really nice to see her laughing and the girls playing together so nicely.
Obviously, we weren't able to make it up to Virginia for my grandmother's memorial service. Randall talked to mom today, and she told him that it went very well. Lots of people shared their memories of her. She was very loved. I really wish we could have heard every word, but it just wasn't possible.
Tomorrow after church, our home health nurse (Amy) is coming to draw a blood culture. She will also help us with Sophie's first bath, and she'll take a look at the PICC site to help us decide whether we need to change the dressing (there was a little dried blood under the dressing when we looked at it today, but we're not sure whether it's enough to justify changing it).
Thanks, as always, for your comments, thoughts, and prayers. It's nice to hear from everyone.