Faith: Sunday - January 9, 2011

DAY 6 SUNDAY JANUARY 9, 2011

marilena writes:

The second surgery may not happen Tuesday. She hasn't had any seizures yet, and unless she has them
tonight or early tomorrow morning, they won't have enough time to do everything prior to scheduled
surgery time on Tuesday. Therefore, the surgery may be rescheduled to Wednesday or Friday.

Eric went to the blood bank yesterday and donated some blood, because we found out that he is the same
blood type as Alannah. And since she needed a blood transfusion during the 1st surgery, he decided to
go ahead and donate in case she would need blood products again. He fainted at the site of his own blood....
ha ha, just kidding. He's a tough old cookie.

Compare Chris came over today, and brought a special lunch from P.F. Chang's. He stayed for a long while and
we had a nice time. While he was there, Zizi Frank came to visit and he played Connect Four with Alannah.
He wanted a rematch with the farm game, but Alannah wasn't handing out rematches today. She wanted to play
Connect Four (see the pics), and she told him where to put all his chips, so she won again! Imagine that!

She was suppose to have an MRI today, but they canceled it because they didn't want to take the chance of missing
any seizures while she was at the MRI. (because during the MRI they would have to unhook her from the monitor).
So MRI will be scheduled for a time after they record some seizures.

eric writes:

Nurse Kalani (yes, this is an Hawaiian name but she was born and rasied in the
'burgh. Her parents were in the service and stationed in Hawaii for a while) is
back for another round tonight. Tonight after Alannah washed up for bed, Kalani
sat down with her and talked about what was going to happen during the midnight
blood draw for her sodium level check. (See pics of Alannah wearing the gloves
and practicing on Kalani.) She is hoping to avoid a repeat of
Alannah's performance from last night.......

[flashback to last night, queue the wavy screen effects]

.....Kalani came in around midnight to draw the blood for the sodium level check
and Alannah just freaked out. She started to cry, whine and got herself so
worked up that she was up for about 2 and half hours. After a little while,
Kalani came back in to try to help settle Alannah down. Kalani sat on the bed
and helped Alannah hold her baby doll and finally got Alannah to sleep. Kalani
got up from the bed and turned around to make sure Alannah was asleep, she raised
the bedside rail halfway and looked at Alannah to make sure she was still asleep,
she raised the rail all the way up and taking care not to make the locking
mechanism click and looked at Alannah to make sure she was still asleep, she went
to open the door and Alannah opened her eyes and said, "Where are you going?". I
watched the whole thing from the other side of the bed and Alannah was sleeping.
Kalani told her she had to go check on the other kids she was looking after and
said she would be right back. Alannah said "OK" and slowly drifted off to dream.

I tried to take some pics without the flash of her sleeping and holding her baby.
Alannah didn't sleep well the night before last and she skipped two days worth
of naps. She has been taken off her anti-seizure meds in an effort to induce
some seizures so that the doctors can get the data to help with the second
surgery. Typically, these meds are weened off and on. Her body has been under
alot of stress from this little thing called brain surgery and this "hat" she has
to wear is really start to get to her. It is so itchy that she wiggles her head
back and forth on the pillows and she has the thing so crooked that it looks like
she a one or two drinks too many. she might be sporting a new head wrap tomorrow.
So, I guess she has a few legitimate reasons to freak out. For a 5 year old, she
is holding up extremely well and deserves a "FREAK OUT" moment or two.

No fevers today, and sodium levels stayed stable.