So Far, It's a Go

James was admitted to the hospital this evening, and so far, everything is on track for surgery tomorrow morning. He's scheduled to be the first case, at around 7:30 AM. (However, even with the first case, I think there's no guarantee that it'll be on time!)

James didn't have a fever this evening, so that's good. The surgery resident didn't seem at all concerned about fever ("we'll just give him Tylenol"), but the anaesthesiologist said that if he has a fever in the morning, they'll cancel the procedure (and we'd have to reschedule). So, keep your fingers crossed.

Mike is staying overnight with him. They've already started an IV and the bowel prep, and James was sleeping when I last talked to Mike.

The hospital experience so far has not been at all what we expected. We have a private room, which is nice, but it's been sort of a do-it-yourself experience. That is, we showed up and the 6th floor staff didn't even know why he was there, so we had to give them his history and explain all of that. (Which is a bit odd considering that all of his treatment has been at this exact same hospital.) And we sort of expected they would have things like ostomy bags and formula (I mean, when you're admitted to the hospital normally you don't have to bring your own food and medical supplies!), but it's a good thing we brought ours, because they didn't have any on hand (although they ordered an extra ostomy bag for us just in case). In fact, they didn't even have diapers in his size. And James peed on the floor when we were changing his diaper and bag, and the nurse didn't even bring us anything to help clean up with (although in fairness, I'm sure she would have if we had asked her, but there were paper towels in the bathroom) -- we were just on our own.

Everyone has been very nice, but the nurses seemed to only come in when they needed to do something (like draw blood). I don't know if it would have been different if we hadn't been able to be there, but we got the unsettling sense that if we weren't in the room, James would be kind of on his own -- it would be hit or miss if anyone would notice that he was crying or needed something. I know it's not intensive care like the NICU, but still, he's a baby -- he can't just push the call button if he needs something! And hopefully things will be different when he's out of surgery; maybe they just pay less attention to patients who are basically healthy or who have their parents with them.

I'm glad we've had such good prior experience with UNC hospitals, because tonight didn't do much to inspire confidence. And although we expected to be there a lot, we didn't necessarily expect to have to be there 24/7 -- but now we almost feel like we're going to have to. Again, though, maybe things will be different tomorrow.

Matthew, meanwhile, had a wonderful evening with Grandma Linda and honorary Grandma Sue. :)