Our Top Ten Lists

The Top Ten Things We WON'T Miss at the Hospital:

1. The smell.  There's just something about the smell of a hospital.
2. The 18" wide parent bed.  How in the world does someone get comfortable on that?
3. Parking garages and trying to remember where you parked this time.  If it weren't for that panic button on our key fob, I fear I'd still be walking in circles.
4. Taking a shower without a shower curtain.  Did you know how much bacteria lives and breeds on your shower curtain?
5. The sound of isolation gowns.  Hearing one being put on outside the door is a nice warning that someone will soon enter, but after all the noisy nights, we'd prefer stealth.
6. The beeping!  The beeps in your own room, in your neighbor's room, at the nurses' station.  The beep that tells you that your medication is almost complete, that it is complete, that it is interrupted by "air in the lines," that your heart monitor notes erratic behavior, that your breathing is too shallow, . . . etc.
7. Courtesy of #6, the intercoms:  "Nurse, to room 18 for a beep."
8. The obligatory IV pole weighed down with his eight pumps and enough connecting tubing to wrap around the world 2 and 1/2 times.
9. The elevators.  Waiting for elevators.  Crowded, smelly elevators.  Lurching elevators.  Elevators that are going to stop . . . at . . . every . . . floor courtesy of the curious child and inattentive parent who just made a sheepish getaway.
10. The 4 a.m. vitals.  Enough said?

The Top Ten Things We WILL Miss at the Hospital:

1. Having a great flat-screen TV with dozens of channels.  (Yes, it is with equal measures of shame and fiscal responsibility that I admit we are one of the few remaining households with limited, antenna TV.)
2. Having unlimited access to movies and games.
3. Receiving kind visits and gifts from various organizations that exist to encourage children with cancer.
4. Learning new games with his Child Life Specialist.
5. Beating his Occupational Therapist at Chicken Foot.
6. Proving to his Physical Therapist that he "can do five more minutes" each day.
7. Having permission to eat ice cream and drink soda any time he wants.
8. Getting to stay up late and sleep in just as late.
9. Having a bathroom all to himself.  (Seven people sharing one small bathroom at home sure made mom glad for the private bathroom!)
10. The nurses.  There are some truly amazing people who took care of him; we will miss seeing them on a daily basis.