I do truly believe that everything happens for a reason.  And with Finley - we believe that more than ever.  But we've now had a couple situations in the last 9 (almost 10) months where we have found things out as a fluke.  Before Finley was discharged after her heart repair surgery - she was supposed to have a full echo done.  Well they were never able to complete hers because she threw such a fit while they were trying to do it.  But since those echos are just meant to be a final baseline and because she seemed fine and her saturations were good, etc - she still came home.  Rewind to last weekend in the ER.  We went in because Finley was super fussy and inconsolable, breathing heavy, sweating profusely, etc.   All of her labs checked out fine.  And when they came in to do an echo, she just happened to be asleep so the limited echo they had ordered turned in to a full blown echo since she slept through the whole thing.  That echo revealed this pressure (90% - 'alarming' level) in her pulmonary valve which, wasn't the reason we were there and I have just been wondering these last couple of days what might have happened and how we would have otherwise found this outside of something really terrible happening,

And as you now know from my brief post last night - Finley came home just in time for the weekend!  The doctor had sort of mentioned the possibility very nonchalantly on Thursday, but I hadn't seen her all day yesterday until one and I had really lost hope at that point that there was any chance in the world.  What a nice surprise!  Finley had a repeat echo yesterday afternoon and it showed that her pressure had gone down a bit further - from 50% to 45% now so the Propranolol has succeeded in cutting that pressure in half!  We just pray that it continues to work well for her.  We are so happy they took the chance to try it.  The funny thing that I have been marveling about since her re-admission is the sweating that had been plaguing her since her surgery - is gone - and it stopped abruptly the day she began taking the Propranolol.  I had mentioned this issue with the sweating to the nurse practitioners a couple of times before her previous discharge - and there can be lots of causes of sweating and they theorized that since she's just had a big change to her anatomy, that is probably what was causing it.  The interesting thing is that cardiac patients pre-surgery tend to sweat a lot because their heart is working extra hard for them.  I am pretty sure all of the doctors think I am nuts because I've not been able to get one of them to confirm my theory, but I just feel like this medicine had to have been the reason it stopped.  When I say she was sweaty - we are talking hair soaking sweating - all of the time.  One of the days before she went home the last time, I was holding her during a nap and when I put her back in her crib - the front of my sweater was wet - so much so that it looked like I spilled something on myself.  And this is how she was most of the time post op - her head was drenched with sweat and the rest of her body was cool and clammy.  I am happy to say - she is sweat free and to be honest - I think her lips and cheeks are a little rosier as well.  So its interesting to me as much as she seemed to be so much different after surgery - it turns out there were still issues we didn't even know were there.  Amazing (and extremely scary at the same time).  So now we wait and pray that this medicine continues to work for her...

Finley still continues to have some tummy issues because they have switched up her antibiotic for her kidney reflux and they've started a new one for the c. difficile. I had been pushing for the previous two days to start her on a probiotic.  This is something we used for Nate when he was having tons of ear infections and the antibiotics were wreaking havoc on his stomach - and I felt like they really worked.  Probiotics aren't something the hospital uses a ton, but the nurses had seen good results in the limited times they used them so they helped me to stay on top of the doctors until they got some for Finley.  The probiotic we are using, Culturelle, is over-the-counter but I just wasn't sure if I could put it in Finley's g-tube (for fear of clogging it) or not.  I am hopeful that this will help not only make her tummy feel better in the short term but also help beef up her immunity in the long term.

I had to take this picture because for some reason, the green lead is ALWAYS her favorite and she always takes it off.  Its also the only one where, if you take if off, none of the others work.  The green lead can frequently be found in Finley's mouth.

While I had been hopeful that Finley would come home yesterday, I have learned my lesson never to say anything to Nate unless I know for sure.  He's been taking it pretty hard when she gets hospitalized and so I really wanted to surprised him yesterday when I picked him up from Grammy's by bringing a special little friend along.  And so Finley and I decided to wait out the rush hour traffic and left the hospital around 6 and stopped at Grammy's on the way home to get Nate.  The funny thing was Nate wasn't at all interested in seeing me - he wanted to stay at Grammy's!!!  That was until he saw who was in the car and then he was super excited and immediately began "sharing" his toys with Finley.  He is just such a sweetheart and loves her so much.  Watching them interact is one of the best things in the world.

Just squeezing in one more nap before I go home.  I am loving this little nest my nurse made for me.

This morning, I am just getting ready to start Finley's spa day.  We do this every time she gets discharged because girlfriend needs a little TLC!  We start by cutting her nails and then I give her a nice long bath, get all of the adhesive off of her skin (from the tape and bandages, etc) and then I rub her down with lots of good lotion and I blow her hair dry for her (I know this sounds crazy but for those who have seen Finley even remotely recently - this kid has TONS of hair and it takes forever to dry on its own).  And so now I am off to pamper my princess!

Have a wonderful weekend!