Hannah’s Journey

Hope everybody is enjoying their Memorial Day holiday. The weather here in Goshen has been great. Hannah and I (mom) got home Sunday afternoon. Hannah is doing great. The plan was to come home last Friday, and we almost made it. On Friday afternoon, they took out all of Hannah’s tubes and disconnected her IV in preparation of sending her home. After one last chest x-ray, she was good to go. We walked the 5 blocks to the Ronald McDonald House very slowly, and packed up the room while we waited for Bill to fight the holiday traffic.

It took us an hour to get to the George Washington Bridge and into New Jersey. That was when Hannah started saying that she thought she had a fever. After we discussed at length what to do, we stopped at the store and bought a thermometer. Hannah’s take on the whole thing was “why go home, you know they are going to tell us to come right back.” Sure enough she had a temperature and it was rising. A phone call to her oncologist had us turning around in Mahwah, NJ and heading back to the hospital. The problem with heading back to the hospital in the evening is that you have to start at the Urgent Care Center in Sloan. They are very nice there, but it was 1:45 a.m. before we were taken back upstairs and settled into a room. Bill checked back into the Ronald McDonald House for the night and headed back to Goshen on Saturday.

After tylenol, Hannah’s fever broke and never came back. However, with just having had surgery, they could not take any chances. None of the tests came back positive for infection, so we headed back home around noon on Sunday. Good thing, since I was out of clean clothes. We went out for some celebratory ice cream on Sunday night and went to the parade today. Bill will be staying home with Hannah this week, working out of the house, while I head back to work at the preschool. It will be great seeing the children. I miss them.

We will be going back to Sloan on June 5 to check in with Hannah’s surgeon and get clearance to start chemo. I am not sure if they will start the chemo immediately or start the following Monday. We are also looking forward to having my sister and niece for a visit the following week. They will be coming in from the Windy City (Chicago), and we can’t wait to see them. Hope everyone has a great week.