Road to Recovery CCU Day 4

Monday January 30th: During the night they weened Piper off of the oxygen, she still had the tube in just in case. We joined the doctors during morning rounds and they initially thought about discharging Piper later that day. However they asked Mark and me if we were comfortable with that. We looked at each other and said we would feel more comfortable if she was monitored for a full day off of oxygen just in case. Especially after the little episode she had Sunday morning, so they agreed. They decided we would be discharged on Tuesday.

At 12:00 we had our mandatory CPR class and our lesson on how to administer her meds. It was very helpful, I had taken a CPR class earlier this year but never really thought I might actually need to use it. So I paid close attention to the nurse showing us what to do. It was also nice that it was just the two of us so we could ask whatever questions we had.

When we went back to the room they had taken Piper's oxygen tubes out and Piper was taking a little nap. So we decided to run over to IKEA to buy our new friend, Callie, (a patient who was in the same POD as Piper) a heart bear just like Piper's.

When we returned we gave Callie's parents the bear and they were so grateful they decided to call the bear Piper, in honor of our little lady. Let me back track on how we met Callie's parents. See everyone in the Cardiac area is pretty much in the same boat. They all have been through a huge life changing situation, however no one talks to each other.  So we (Mark) decided to break the silence and went across the POD and talked to Callie's parents who we had seen visiting Callie since Thursday.

We found out that Callie was born with a congenital heart defect known as Transposition of the Great arteries, where the aorta and pulmonary artery are switched. They knew that she would need this surgery at their 20 week ultrasound so they had come to terms with it much faster then we had. However knowing that your one day old would be having open heart surgery is never an easy thing. Callie's surgery was actually performed right after Piper's by Dr.Spray.

We spent the rest of the day watching our Friends dvds on Piper's TV. In between the cuddles, her feeding and changing those diapers, it helped us get somewhat back into a routine. I'm so glad that Piper seems to be back to her good old self giving us smiles.