Drew's birthday & Ellie's eyes

,A month ago today, on Andrew's birthday, Ellie went cross-eyed.  I noticed it while we were at lunch and, naturally, I was concerned.  I called our pediatrician and left a message for the advice nurse.  It took awhile to hear back and when we finally did the advice was to go to Fairfax Hospital's Pediatric E.R. because they could do the proper testing.  Awesome. We were in the E.R. for a few hours, with various medical personnel examining Ellie (who was surprisingly cooperative--I think she liked the attention).  In the end they decided to admit us so that Ellie could have an MRI the following day to check to check things out.  When I pressed them for the worse case scenario they said, tumor on her brain stem (because both eyes were crossing).

I was supposed to go my friend's annual ugly sweater party that night, instead I spent the night in the hospital with Elle.  Andrew was supposed to go to dinner with his buddy, Dan.  Instead Drew and Dan headed to the E.R. to give Ellie a blessing then Dan and his wife, Sharon, took Lainey home with them so they could watch her the next day (thanks again).

Spending the night in the hospital wasn't too bad.  Gabrielle was pretty excited for her first night solo in a big kid bed.  Plus, she got to watch all the cartoons she wanted.  One of her favorite things to do was call daddy on the phone (not my cell phone, the big one with the fun cord).

Ellie was surprisingly compliant with all the doctors, specialists, nurses, and so on who poked, prodded, and otherwise check her, except for the pediatric neurologist.  By the time she came around Elle was just done and she refused to open her eyes.

Since she was going under anesthesia, Gabrielle had to have an IV.  I was worried about how she would respond--after all, IV's hurt.  I held Ellie and covered her eyes because she refused to look away, but she didn't even flinch when the needle went in so after that I let her watch.  Mostly she was upset that blood got all over her gown and the bed (kept saying "messy!").  The nurses were impressed with her response and said, "maybe she'll be a doctor or a nurse."  I was thinking, maybe, more likely she has no idea what blood is so it doesn't freak her out.

 We were anticipating an MRI first thing in the morning so Ellie couldn't eat after midnight.  We didn't actually get have the MRI till about 3:30 p.m.  Lame.  Sometimes Ellie asked for food and I just reminded her that we couldn't eat yet.  To my surprise she just said, alright and went back to whatever she was playing with or watching at the moment.  I did feel like a bit of a jerk, though, sneaking out into the hallway for a bite to eat when Drew came to sit with her around lunchtime. 

After we dropped Ellie off at the MRI room we were shown to the parent's waiting room.  The t.v. was already playing and that's when I learned of the school shootings in Connecticut.  It was a shock and certainly put all our anxiety over Ellie into perspective.

Ellie's MRI was normal so we were referred to a pediatric ophthalmologist who, surprisingly, was able to get us in the same morning I called to make an appointment (really like him).  He diagnosed Ellie as "extremely farsighted" and gave us a prescription for glasses.  It took over two weeks to get those darn glasses.  I went into two stores only to be told that they didn't carry glasses for toddlers.  After that I wised up and started calling ahead.  The next four places I tried didn't have glasses for toddlers either so I trekked back out to the ophthalmologist's office in Fairfax and ordered them from his in-house shop (if you are ever in this situation learn from my mistake and just order them from the doc on day one).

Ellie's had her glasses for a little over a week now and she's been pretty good about wearing them (expect when she's in the van and knows I can't reach her then she plays with them or flings them to the ground).

And Andrew's birthday?  It wasn't a total bust.  We got home from the hospital just in time to race around and collect our children, put them to bed, and make it to a 10 p.m. comedy show at Arlington Drafthouse.  I had purchased the tickets months ago and was really glad we didn't have to abandon them.   We saw Tommy Johnagin and he was hilarious.  On Sunday the girls made Andrew his favorite, "Better than Sex Cake" (I told Liz it was called "Better than anything cake").