Rainbows

I am going to start where I left off last night. Almost immediately after I was done writing, Naya started desating. (Desating is when oxygen levels decrease) A lot and drastically. I was crying and had to leave the room. It was terrifying. I went down to the Chapel and sat there for awhile while Dan stayed in the room with her. I felt bad leaving him alone but I didn't want to freak out in the room. After about an hour, they were able to get her sats up a bit and I returned to her room. Dan and stayed here until about 11:00 or so and then trudged back to the house feeling a bit defeated. We had gotten a bit spoiled by the 5 good days.

This morning, we came in and her saturations were a bit better but not great. The positive though was that despite this slip, her blood pressure has remained consistent. We stayed here for awhile and then Dan, Toni, Ty and I walked to the Church up the street. Again, it was a pleasant experience. I actually really like this particular church - not at all preachy and definitely more a learning and loving atmosphere. There was a baptism today that I found quite beautiful. The Reverend asked the congregation to hold out our hands and send our own blessings to the water. I blessed her with strength. Dan asked for her health. I felt a bit like the fairies in Sleeping Beauty, offering the princess gifts that should prove to be useful in her life. It was very touching.

Afterwards, we came back to the hospital and hung out for awhile. My sister set Ty up with a gmail address. So far, I've gotten about 8 one sentence messages. My favorite said "this thing is so cool!" My son just discovered email. Naya had a pretty steady rest of the day and remains about the same right now. My favorite part was that we were able to ween the pressers quite a bit, which everyone is very happy about. Her heart is beginning to show some signs of recovery, which is a beautiful thing. Now we just need to get her lungs to follow suit.

We left at shift change and walked to a pizza place a couple blocks away for dinner. As we were walking there, we noticed some dark clouds in the sky. A thunderstorm was coming in.

For the rest of the country (and the world) this might not seem like a big deal but we are in LA. It doesn't rain in September in LA and it especially doesn't Thunderstorm. As we were eating dinner, it started raining a bit and thundering and lightning outside although the sun was still shining. Of course, that made a rainbow. I thought about this awhile and realized that last Monday, when Dan and I were walking to the hospital in the morning, it started sprinkling a bit in area that was directly over the hospital. I didn't think much of it then but that was the day that Naya got the chest tube in and the edema started leaving her body. Perhaps the rain was a sign of changing times and this thunderstorm is the same - the rain washed away the weakness in her heart and this storm will do the same for her extremely sick lungs. At least that's what I want to believe in - the light at the end of the rainbow.