Home Sweet Home

There's so much I could say about the last 4 days.  I will have to write several posts over the next few days, so suffice it to say for now:

 90 DAYS LATER,

WE

ARE

HOME!!!!!! 

My heart is happy.

My cup runneth over.

etc. etc. etc.

Leaving the hospital Thursday was somewhat surreal.  We arrived that morning, signed some papers, and that was about it!  Saying goodbye to everyone was hard.  Very hard.  Those doctors and nurses and support staff have been like family for the last 3 months.  They laughed with us and dried our tears.  They cared for Parker on a level I didn't know was possible.  They snuck him out of his room at all hours for snuggle sessions at the nurses station.

They saved our baby.

I said goodbye to his two primaries, Jaime and Ashley, Sunday night.  Ashley was our primary on the A side, and Jaime on the swings and B side.  Love love love those girls.  Our day shift gals, who worked with Parker most often, were Kate and the incomparable supernurse Sarah.  They, and all of their colleagues, made it possible for us to walk out of that hospital every day and know that he was cared for.

There was a near constant parade of people in our room as we were packing up Thursday.  Parker had developed quite a reputation amongst the staff as a shameless flirt, and he acquired many lady friends with his smile.  They were genuinely sad that he would not be there anymore, but so thrilled for him to be going home.

We got the P-nut all dressed up in his frat-tastic going home outfit.  My grandmother got him and Jeremiah these outfits for Christmas, 3 days after we found about his diagnosis.  I remember trying so hard not to cry when I opened it, wishing and praying so hard that he would wear it one day. 

*totally crying a little bit right now*

 We left there armed with a PILE of paperwork and follow up appointments.

We packed up our business and went down the hallway for the last time.

We ceremonially dropped our badges in the checkout box by the elevator (that box taunted me for 90 days.  I GOT YOU, BOX!)

 

We marched triumphantly through those hallways, rode down that final elevator, and loaded Parker into the car.

We both then promptly burst into tears.

We drove to my grandmother's house to get Jeremiah.  We pulled up in her driveway and burst into tears again, remembering the day that we pulled into the driveway on the day Parker almost died.  (We had to come back for my medicine, and we had been kicked out of the NICU while the urologist tried some last ditch efforts to keep him alive.  I can't tell you how many prayers were said in that driveway, some of pleading and some of praising.  Goosebumps.)

We went inside, ate lunch, and realized that we are finally all together.

 

We drove home, and got all settled in.  But we DID make one stop on the way home...

 You had to have seen that one coming.  :-)