6% huh? Let's do it!

This morning, despite TS Hanna (which, by the way Bob, made her schedule far after we made ours!), we woke up bright and early, carried a sleepy child to the car and drove to PCMC. Today was the day we were having Carli's mole removed. She was very upset yesterday when I told her she wouldn't be able to have any breakfast or any drink which is why I told her we would just carry her to the car and she wouldn't even realize she was starving to death, right then, cause she hadn't eaten a single morsel since...well 730 last night.

We get to the hospital about 820 and get checked in. The nurses and doctors were non stop coming into the room to make sure Carli was comfortable, had books to read, toys to play with and cartoons to watch.

Finally (and by finally, I mean about a half hour later), the dermatologist who will be doing surgery and the anesthesiologist (whom most women that have given birth call...THE MAN!) come in to clear up any questions and such. We were good to go. They asked us to follow them down the hall and we walked into this little mini operating room. They had Carli hop up on the bed, choose a smell for her sleepy mask, and then the doctor asked if she would play a game with him. She was game...totally! He had this little balloon hooked to his machine (it actually looked like one of those old blue ice bag things that were made of rubber and had pleat looking things in it, remember those?) and asked if she could blow up that balloon and make it move. Turns out, she can! Before we knew it, her leg that was up...came down and so did her eye lids. They told us they would come and get us out of that same room when she was starting to wake up. So, with a mommy kiss to her hand and a stern warning to the staff to "take care of my kid" we were off. It was about 915 when we went back into the room, Cobby went to get him a cup of coffee which he had been wanting since he just woke up. But when I politely reminded him in the car that it would be rude to drink something in front of his starving daughter...he gave up (or agreed, whatever you want to call it).

I swear about 15 minutes later the doctor walked by and said she was all done and they would come and get us in a minute. So the nurse stops in, says Carli is waking up and that we can go to her. As we walk in they are giving her some water (in one of those little mini water bottles that I won't buy, because the big ones are cheaper). She looked like she was just waking in up in the morning. And since they want to make sure the medicine they gave her won't make her sick, they offered her a snack (and since she had been STARVING since the night before, how could she turn it down?). Her choices were chips (of several varieties), Oreo's and some other crackers. Hmmm, now let's see...which one would you choose? Well, her too. She chose Oreos. And when she finished those off, she wanted chips too. The nurse took her vital signs a few times while we were standing there and when she gave her the bag of chips she said we were all done and could go now. So we left...and it was only 1015. It's hard to believe in a matter of two hours that they can knock my kid out, cut a big chunk of her skin off, cram some cookies chips and water down her (breakfast of champions) and send us on our way. And all of this will decrease my daughter's chance of getting skin cancer by 6% over her lifetime. What a great day.

And just because I wasn't sure what to expect, how long she would be 'down' and whatever, I

had cleared my whole weekend. You know when your kid is sick, you just want to be with her...or make her think you are there with her, whatever. And how often can you plan a month ahead for that? Well, in these old hair covered jammies you can't even tell they were carving up her leg. But her bandage underneath is about the size of this jawbreaker she has been sucking on for the past 6 weeks. And she is taking full advantage of being told she can watch Disney Channel today. We should have saved that promise for after we saw how she was feeling. They did tell us that she shouldn't be operating heavy machinery (so much for getting the fields plowed today), jumping on trampolines or running around the playground today (her local might make that one leg feel a little weird and she may fall - like that's never happened). But I don't see why she can't be out mowing the lawn, it's not like she usually takes that thing down the slide with her anyway...and even if she did, it's not 'heavy' so it doesn't count.

In a couple of days we can take off her bandage, then I will post some before and after's. How much fun will that be?