Out of the ICU

Katelynn has now been moved out of the ICU. One of her chest tubes has been removed. They plan on removing her PD catheder (that they used for dialysis) and the other chest tube this weekend. She is off of her sedation drugs, and today I saw the first smile and heard the first laugh I have heard out of her in two weeks, which as a mother made me very happy. She is eating regular food (well, a low-sodium diet, but basically normal food) and has a lot more strength than she has had in weeks.

It is amazing to me how quickly kids can get sick and then bounce back. They have so much resiliency. At this point I don't know for sure how much longer she will be in the hospital. Last I heard was that they would keep her in the 'kidney department' for a week after she left the ICu, but that's the last thing I heard. I think they want to keep her to study, because she is not a textbook case of Nephrotic Syndrome. They can't figure her out and would like to. All they know is that she is spilling proteins into her urine, indicating that her kidneys aren't filtering them properly. And that she is/was retaining water like crazy. And that she's basically all kinds of messed up.

I told Katelynn that if she wanted to do something more exciting for her third birthday than cake and ice cream with the fam we could have figured out something different. She didn't have to take it upon herself to plan a getaway to Dallas. Or maybe she just thought she wasn't getting enough attention, since she is the middle child. I don't know. All I know is that I don't think I can handle much more excitement this year!!