Hospital Journal: In and Out

Spencer's room.

I'm not really sure how I feel about PCMC: CICU-Bed 10. It is a place of nightmares. I lived the worst moments of my life in that little room. However, it is also a place of miracles. It is sacred ground.

I guess if I have to pick, I would have to say that I love that room. It became home to us. We were asked occasionally, if the unit was fairly empty, if we would like to switch rooms. The one next to us has two windows. "No thanks." The room around the corner has a toilet. "Really. No thanks."  I'm actually not superstitious, at all. But I started to feel like Bed 10 was lucky, and I just plain didn't want to move.

Here is a picture of Spencer's room. This is when he was on ECMO. Now, it wasn't quite this busy for the entire three months. As a matter-of-fact, about a week after this picture was taken they put the sliding glass doors back in place so that we could close them. I think we probably made the CICU staff crazy because we would sit out at their desk to work on our laptop or make phone calls, but for a time there just simply wasn't anywhere for us in Spencer's room.


I felt a real urgency to get pictures of Spencer's hung up in his room. I wanted to make sure that the staff knew what a sweet, happy, active, handsome little boy he was.

One of the views from Spencer's bed.


This isn't the best view of his room, but it gives you an idea of the little corner that I took possession of. Early on, one of the nurses mentioned another family who had lived on the CICU and had hung curtains in the room. My initial thought was, "That's crazy." But it was like a little nagging idea that got bigger and bigger until I thought that hanging curtains was the most brilliant idea I'd ever heard. I spent hours mapping out the room in my head until one Saturday I announced that we were moving the bed so that he would be able to see out the window and that I was bringing in a bookshelf, a lamp and curtains. It was AWESOME! Spencer could turn toward the window--and away from the door and the staff--and see toys and books and items from home.  The lamplight in the evening gave it such a cozy feel. It was just right to snuggle up on the bed with him and read stories. That little corner also gave Matt and me a place to sit where we didn't feel like we were constantly in the way of our nurses.

You can see that we didn't hesitate to add our own personal touches to the walls. It made for quite the chore when it was time to leave this room.

Another view of his corner, along with his Christmas tree and the paper chain counting down to Christmas.


Although we spent the majority of our time in that room, we did take the occasional outing around the hospital.  The Spiderman statue was a favorite.



We also took him outside a few times to the Angel Garden. We were so glad for the mild Fall weather.


We became very familiar with the entire PICU from all the laps that we did. Wheelchair, bike, walker--it didn't matter--he just liked to go.

He loved this fish tank and we spent a good deal of time here.  We still do, as this is the waiting room for same-day surgery when he has his biopsies.

Riding his bike outside about a week after transplant.

So you can see we had lots of options. Whether we felt like a lively night out or a quiet evening in, we were content. :)