Neil: A change is not as good as a rest

All in together girls

We went up to visit my in-laws for the week, so that they could meet Calista. We also needed a break, as we had not been able to get out of London for months. While we were visiting, a family friend came round and said, “A change is as good as a break”, but we weren’t so sure, as we had worn ourselves out getting there and were too exhausted to enjoy ourselves.  However, once we got home, after recovering from the 500 miles round trip, we did really appreciate seeing the Grandparents and the break from our routine.

The day we travelled we all got up at 6am to disconnect Jasmine. I then went to pick up the largest hire car we could find, a Volvo V70 estate this time. Ruth had been packing for 48 hours and going through her checklists. She got the girls ready while I loaded the car. We left at 11:00am and arrived at 6:30pm after many feeding and vomit stops. We then had to unload everything, set up the machine, make the milk, and get everyone to bed. We flopped into bed ourselves about 1am.

Overnight we had more alarms than usual. Jasmine wasn’t at the correct height relative to the dialysis machine, so didn’t fill up properly. The machine kept alarming until it finally stopped working altogether, so we phoned the renal ward at GOSH. We tried a few things, then they suggested turning the machine off at the mains, and back on again. We thought we were talking to IT support by mistake :-) That worked and Jasmine got through the rest of the night okay.

The next day an administrator from GOSH phoned up to schedule an MRI for Jasmine. We weren’t expecting the call and she was going on about MRIs, GAs, AM surgery lists and booking a bed on the ward for the overnight stay. As she wasn’t medically trained she couldn’t explain what she was talking about and freaked us out. A medical registrar phoned us back and explained that Jasmine has to be prepped on the ward as she needs a general anaesthetic for the MRI scan, so she stays still. We have the option to stay overnight, but we will get up early and go in for 7 am.

The day before we were due to come home we had recovered enough to try to enjoy ourselves, but then we had start packing all over again to get ready to leave.

2 Responses to “Neil: A change is not as good as a rest”

  1. Jill Winslow says:

    hope the MRI brings you one step closer to transplant and that you geta well needed break! Hugs your way, Jill

  2. Leo says:

    Great to read that you took a little break (even though a change is not as good as rest :) ). Closing fingers for the MRI, and as Jill was saying, here is hope this bring the transplant closer!.

    Sorry we are a bit out of Touch, Claudia is working long hours in the summer and we are squeezing a lot of things for the weekend, but we are all good here … looking forward to our own break in a exactly 10 days 😛

    The girls are gorgeous, more pics please!
    Love!
    Leo

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