June 15, 2007, 2:57 PM PDT, Friday

You don't always get the nurse you want!!! Yesterday we had a nurse who was semi detached from reality. You know, seated in a chair, 20 foot stare in a 15 foot building. However we had plenty of family watching over the Tamale. Molly began to stir with twangs of pain on her face when, in walks mom.

Mary King phd, Md, M, RT, B.S. "Why is she in pain?" she demands, "When was the last time she had morphine, she gets it every hour!" You should have seen our friend the stoned nurse leap to his feet and check his charts. "4:00," he says " was the last dose of morphine."

'Dr.' King replied whithout skipping a beat, "That's 3 1/2 hours ago she needs more!" and, lo and behold, 30 seconds later, Molly is relaxed and comfortable again. That's the mom you want when something goes wrong!!!

Dr. Reddy, or 'Steady Reddy' as we refer to him, the surgeon who performed Molly's operation, is routinely checking up on Molly. Each time Ol' Steady Reddy shows up in the ICU, he says things like, "Why is she still on the ventilator? Get her off the ventilator! She needs her exercise!" You should see the nurses scramble.

Today Steady Reddy showed up, questioned the nurses about Mollys chest tubes, got the information he was looking for and said, "Take that tube out today and the sub-clavian line." Then he looks at Mary and me with a wonderful smile and says, "Everything looks fine. She will be fine." ...and walks out of the room. We all look forward to visits from Steady Ready.

One more story: This is when I almost self admitted to the cardiac ward.

When Molly was rolled into surgery, they gave us a pager and said, "We will not page you until the surgery is over unless we need to talk to you about something unexpected. This surgery is going to take a minimum of 6 hours." And, off the Tamale rolls. We were all sitting on the patio talking and joking, about 3 hours into the surgery. Mary, luckily, was snooring on a couch. I was mid sentence in a story when " beep, beep" goes the "beeper" Bolting down the hall, I flew into the Cardiovascular Intensive Care Unit (CVICU) and asked desperately about my beeper that was going off. The nurse replied (remember, you can't always pick your nurses!), "Oh, I must have dialed the wrong pager number. I was dialing a dialysis nurse."

Stanford, the model of excellence!! I replied not knowing what else to say, "Well let's just hope the cardiac team is a little more organize,." ..and walked out in disbelief. Anyhow there are a few stories from the Odyssey of Molly.

We all hope to see everyone soon and to return to a more familiar life. Thanks for all the jokes, possitive energy, prayers, phone calls, and everything else the Molly network has provided. Our love to all of you and I know Molly thanks you too. Thanks to Laura for the beautiful get well soooooooooooooooon card.

Kevin Mary Noah Nicholaus and Molly

 

• Medical Update: Molly is off the breathing tube and keeping herself alive! She had another x-ray this morning and her lungs are clear! She took food through the food tube this morning, then had pedialite in a bottle, and then milk in a bottle! Mary has gotten to hold her once, for a moment. Oh, how important moments are! The surgeon told the doctors to get the sub-clavian tube (under the clavicle) and one of the chest tubes out today. Molly's white count is at the higher end of normal, but no one seems to be too concerned. It is not indicative of infection yet and if it goes up, they will put her on antibiotics.

  Kevin said they have been moved into another room (I guess intensive care comes in layers) .... "closer to the exit sign."

Another day... another wonderful report from Mollyland!