Highs and Lows

When Sam went to bed tonight, I asked him (as I usually do), "was today a good day?"

And he answered, "yes."

So I asked, "what was the best part?"

And he said, "David."

Then he rolled over and went to sleep.

Ah, I wish it were that simple.

It WAS a good day, all in all.

Sure, his counts are down...he's no longer on round-the-clock nausea meds, but he has to ask for them instead. He's eating a little more. The C.Diff is under control but we're still in isolation and taking antibiotics.

David came today. Sam was so happy to have him here.

It's so interesting to watch them together - there was a lot of chatting and showing and telling and doing, but there was also a lot of sitting together, playing separately on video games or watching a movie together. Side-by-side, but not interacting every moment. But for Sam....he was just drinking in being in David's presence. Sharing the same air. Having him around and being able to show him all the things about which he has been saying "I can't wait to show that to David!" Big brother adoration is an amazing thing. And for all David's too-cool-for-little-brother-stuff bluster...he was pretty adoring of Sam, too. It was sweet and wonderful.

Picnic lunch

Randi read one of Sam's favorites - the Berenstain Bears

(Frankly, I'd rather hear them complaining about chores and who has to do which part of the dishwasher and "he got more cookies" and "let me go first" and "leave me alone"....because it would be normal...but I'll be quiet now and just revel in the love today, right?)

Then David left.
 
And Sam came down.
From the Cloud 9,999 that he was on.

Back to the reality of room E582. Without his family. (well, except me. But according to him, at that moment, I just didn't count.)

Poor guy. I was so sad. Because I knew that there was nothing I could do to help him "fix" this problem. So we watched some television and sat in glum silence....even a visit from a favorite staff member didn't help. Okay, maybe it helped a little. There was a glimmer of a smile.

A little moping resting

And then slowly, equilibrium returned.

I suggested a bath, and I let him stay in there until he turned quite pruney...even added more warm water. My little fish swam round and round the small tub, making silly faces and telling stories about sharks and turtles. We dreamed together about swimming with the dolphins in Hawaii and visiting the turtles on the Galapagos Islands.

And I took a big deep breath and let it out slowly....with a burst of energy, a few sword-fights and some paper-folding and some coloring....

Playing "Plants vs. Zombies" on my laptop. The cool folks at PopCap games joined Team Superman Sam today - awesome pics of their staff and a few cool stuffed plants that fight zombies (if you like this game, you'll know what that means). Sam wanted to see if the PC version of the game was the same as the iPhone version. It is. Except we were able to make our own zombie. All of this added to Sam's perk-up, you know.

Wearing the fencing helmet of Samantha Roberts, Team USA Fencer and 2016 Olympic hopeful!

Pre-bedtime sword-fighting with our night-time nurse...Who says you can't sword-fight while hooked up to an IV?

Then suddenly it was bedtime.
So we lay together and read bedtime books in the quiet of the room, just the two of us....
....and the day was pronounced "good."