Mixed Emotions

Today is the beginning of our very last inpatient chemo!  I am so very excited to know that we are nearing the end of living at the hospital.  Maybe the feeding tube will come out soon and other than a bunch of oral medicines, life can return to what we called normal a while ago.  I know that we will be on medicines for at least until Christmas time until Odette's counts are back up and she is "healthy".  A few  medicines sounds heavenly!  We also do love all of our new friends at the hospital and are always excited to see them and hear them say, "Odette is the most beautiful baby ever!"

On the other hand, I really don't want to go back up to the hospital.  That is where I see my happy baby Odette get sick and feel miserable.  We are stuck in a teeny tiny room for what feels like an eternity and it can be super boring.  Odette has figured out that she doesn't like it here in her room and will scream when we go in after being in the hallway.  (She can be in the hallway when she isn't getting chemo and her counts are above 0.5, which is for a couple of days.)  It is also where I see so many sad things happen, that I haven't figured out how to deal with yet.  My heart breaks every time a new cancer patient comes, when someone is really sick, or when one earns their angel wings. 

This time on our trip I tried to prepare for EVERYTHING that would come our way:

• I didn't spare in what I packed.  I don't care if it takes me a dozen trips to get it all in the room.  I want my now mobile and very smart Odette to be as "at home" as possible.  The entire back end of the van was full of all sorts of fun toys for her, as well as a play yard so she can feel like she is crawling all over the floor.
• We made some special thank you treats to share with all of our nurse, techs and doctor friends.  They are bags of jelly beans that have a tag attached that reads, "Life's 'bean' better with you in it. --Love Odette."  These people are like our family and we truly love them all.
• We got some disposable cameras and decorated some note cards so that all her friends here could write Odette a message and take a picture so that they can always be remembered.  (I hope the nurses cooperate in this!)  Odette will know how to read before I know it!
• I brought things to keep my mind occupied...so many things that I am sure I won't know where to start, but at least I will feel at home!

So here we go...to get our last chemo...to our friends...to our sea of orange shirts(it is Monday)...so that we can return home successful!