This was a good week, fast, and mostly uneventful. I was able to go to the gym nearly every day during the week (every day but Friday where I stayed home and caught up on housework). I got to eat lunch with Andy on base on Friday with Beverly and Harvey during one of his 24 hr shifts, and Saturday was filled with kids’ friends’ birthday parties, a baby shower, and date night. It was a busy day! Though Andy is working 68-70 hrs a week, it hasn’t been too bad. The consistency has been kind of nice as well as the fact that he’s only gone two of the 7 evenings. Andy is pretty worn out though. Typically ICU months are not even grin and bear it, but simply just bear it, but this month has been a lot easier. And though Andy is worn out, it is easier than his other ICU months that he’s done at AU. The base is a lot slower paced, he only has 1-4 patients, and their conditions seem to be a lot more mild than those that come to AU. The biggest challenge he has faced (aside from getting sleep during his 24 hr shifts) are the less than trained family medicine residents. They just don’t have the same level of a acuity at Eisenhower as they do at AU. These residents at Eisenhower haven’t been exposed to nearly the number nor breadth of issues. This makes it challenging for Andy when he’s trying to get sleep and something goes wrong or a resident doesn’t want to handle a floor patient and tries to hand him off to ICU (which Andy won’t tolerate). During the day, however, it has led for many opportunities for Andy to teach, which he loves and thrives on.

Things at home are good. We have a good routine, and I’m learning how to handle and juggle it all, even with Harvey continuing to deprive me of sleep. He is doing a little better this week. Andy discovered one morning that if he gave Harvey a bottle and a kiss he’d stay in bed… at least for a couple of hours. By the end of the week he was sleeping till 5/5:30. I’m hoping that number keeps increasing, but for now, that’s a win. I did have a scare Friday evening. One of my kids’ friends left and either didn’t shut the door tight or Harvey managed to open it (which he does know how to do, but I didn’t hear the door chime when he opened it). I didn’t realize he was gone for a few minutes. He was quiet.. too quiet… and that’s when my mother-anxiety turns up and I jump to my feet, ready to meet the next disaster. This time it was a door that was wide open. I ran to Lindsay’s house, because that’s his usual “hangout.” I knocked on the door to see if he had let himself in. He had not. Crap. Luckily, however, when I turned around I saw him about five houses down standing by someone’s garage, holding his bottle with his dog not too far from him. They had just decided to take themselves on a walk. Andy has installed an extra thief proof lock on the top of our door, but because we had friends coming and going, it hadn’t been locked while I was busy making dinner. I couldn’t even get after my kids for that because they can’t reach the lock. My anxiety has been a little high lately, and no wonder. It is a full time job keeping that kid safe and out of trouble. This too shall pass, but in the meantime, I’m exhausted. The only picture I took this week is a picture of Bev with her “Rapunzel hair” (aka her blanket) and a bowl of Ramen. Though I do have some videos of Harvey, I’ll try and see if I can post those.