Back Home at Last

Great news! My Dad came home on Friday after 2 months in the hospital. Needless to say, he is so happy to be home. There will be a caregiver staying at my parent's home every night to help out, and there will be rehabilitation specialists making house calls throughout the week for therapy. My Dad still has a little ways to go before he can be physically independent. With minor assistance, he can walk with a walker, and feed himself.

And I am so happy that my Mom won't have to spend her days at the hospital, but rather at home with the man she loves. We've seen enough of hospitals for a long while.

Kayla and Matthew got to see Grandpa for the first time in months this weekend, and it made their day. They have really missed him, and have been so concerned about him.

Kayla's Birthday - a little late

So, our little Kayla girl turned three over 7 weeks ago, but family events being what they were over Fourth of July weekend (my Dad's aneurysm on July 3rd), I didn't get around to posting about it. Her birthday certainly is more than worthy of earning a post in our family blog, so here it is...better late than never.

We first celebrated Kayla's birthday at her daycare and brought rainbow cupcakes with rainbow frosting to give all the kids a good sugar high before their moms and dads came to pick them up. Matthew and Kayla helped to make the cupcakes, and thoroughly enjoyed licking the beaters (who doesn't?).

Next we celebrated Kayla's birthday with a small impromptu gathering at our home. She opened presents from family, and we had my mom, my Aunt Carol, and Andrew's mom Janet there with us to make the day special for Kayla. One of her favorite presents that night was a beautiful Tinker Bell costume complete with sparkly light-up shoes, fairy wings and a magic wand.

Our final celebration for Kayla was a party at a neighborhood park. She had three "requirements" for her party...a pinata, her two bff's from daycare, and a Tinkerbell cake. I stayed up until midnight making that cake, but it was fun and turned out pretty good, if I do say so myself.

Here is Kayla with her two best friends - Callie and Sharna.

The next two pics are of Kayla pulling a pinata string, and opening her presents sitting next to my sister's kids (Marie-left, and Emma-right)

So, even though it was one of the most difficult, most emotional weekends of my life with my Dad's aneurysm, we managed to give Kayla the celebrations she deserved. I'm so proud of the beautiful and sweet little girl she is. And even though her hands often seem possessed and can't stop touching things, and her hearing seems to be rather selective for such a young girl, her antics make us laugh and her love make our hearts melt. Happy Birthday sweetheart!

Football is coming...

Just a quick update to let people know that my Dad is back at the medical rehabilitation center as of Friday, and things are going very well. He is on blood thinners to dissolve the clots in his body, and that seems to have helped with the confusion and speech. He is getting a little stronger and every day brings him one step closer to going home. So far so good.

On another note, we are gearing up for school to start for both Matthew (Kindergarten) and Andrew (teaching and coaching). I must say that I am really excited for Matthew to start at our local school because I am looking forward to meeting more people in the neighborhood. Matthew is a little anxious about meeting new people and what to expect of Kindergarten in general.

Football is about to start and is heading at us like a freight train. This begins the most hectic and stressful time of year for the Welsh family, as Andrew takes on a 70 hour work week, and my life resembles that of a single mom. I am not looking forward to it, but I know that we will get through it as we always do.

Matthew has started a fall soccer league and is so excited about it. Unfortunately, the coach thinks that kids under 6 need two practices a week, so that just adds more stuff to our already busy lives.

I have given up my beloved dance lessons for the fall, as it doesn't work with our new schedule, but I've picked up another hobby -- adult gymnastics class. I know, crazy, huh? But, I'm totally excited about doing some gymnastics again.

That's all for now!

A major setback...

My Dad was transferred last week to a medical rehabilitation center for physical and occupational therapy. We were so excited that he was moving on and were sure that with the aggressive therapy there he would be back on his feet in no time. He has continued to have some slurring of speech and confusion, which we all figured was likely still due to the drugs that he had been given for such a lengthy period of time during his ICU stay. The new doctors and nurses, however, wanted to run some tests to determine if anything else was going on.

They performed a CT scan, MRI, and Doppler of my Dad's head and neck this weekend and found some disturbing things. He has a clot in his lung, and I think 3 clots in his brain that have formed recently (within the last 3-4 days or so). So, he was taken back to the ER yesterday afternoon, and was placed back into ICU last night. They have started him on blood thinning medication to dissolve the clots, but this carries with it significant risk for internal bleeding (following his recent surgery). We will be walking a fine line for a while. It is risky to do nothing, but also risky to give the blood thinner, as well.

The good news is that they may have found an issue that could have reared its ugly head in a fatal way in a matter of days. The bad news is that we have taken a major step backward and are back in the ICU for an undetermined number of days. These setbacks really take their toll on the whole family. The range of emotions we've experienced over the last month have been just exhausting.