TheMommyBlog

Tuesday, April 13, 2004 Familybits

Dylan, Daphne and I were just hanging out in the kitchen, eating pizza and talking about nothing in particular. It’s just about my favorite thing to do.

Dylan: “Mommy, when Mrs. Jumbo went on the train, she had a baby.”
Me: “Yep. The stork brought her baby Dumbo while she was on the train.”
Dylan: “Yeah. She was on the train.” [ponders]
Me: “Do you remember where I was when I had my babies?”
Dylan: [perking up] “Where?”
Me: “In the hospital. You were all born in the hospital. Do you remember coming to see me there after Daphne was born?”
Dylan: “Is that when I was sick last time?”
Me: “Well, you were sick when you were born, a long time before Daphne was born.”

[long pause]

Dylan: “Mommy, what were those things on my tummy?”
Me: “Oh… the sticky things?”
Dylan: “Yeah. What were they?”
Me: “Well, they were there so we could listen to your heart all the time, like we do with the stethoscope.”
Dylan: “You mean like sticky stethoscopes?”
Me: “Yes, exactly.”
Dylan: “I didn’t like them.”
Me: “They were there for just a little while.”
Dylan: “Mommy, when those sticky stethoscopes were on my tummy, I went like this [grimaces] because I wanted to go home.”
Me: “You did?”
Dylan: “Yes. I wanted to go home and meet you.”

My heart melted all over the floor.

Of course he doesn’t remember the eight or nine IVs going into every vein in his body, or the umbilical catheter, or the blown cranial veins, or the pic lines, or the EKG tabs, or the monitors, or the pint-sized defibrillator at his bedside.

He doesn’t remember coming home with a mohawk and an addiction to morphine, all thin and looking like a lost teen.

But he does remember all the times we went back to Stanford for the follow-up EKGs and echocardiograms.

And he knows that he almost died, and that he’s all better now.

And that home is very great.