Day 39 - July 24 - Not so roto?

I got to see the boy this morning around 10 o'clock, and they had him on his back after spending the afternoon and overnight in the face down position. He was in pretty good spirits, and Kent and I got to laugh and talk with him a bit before we got kicked out for more X-rays. Before we left, the nurse told us that he has responded so well overnight that they were going to test his blood gases again, and if the doctors liked what they saw, they would leave him on his back and see how he improved from there.

So, there's a possibility that Connor won't need to return to his stomach! That would indeed be an answer to prayer!

NEWS FLASH - The nurse just advised me that they are going to keep him on his back through the night! If his blood gases stay where they need to be, and his lungs continue to clear tomorrow, they'll consider putting him back on the rightside-up bed. Praise the Lord for that!

And now, a word about our family and our nicknames -

I had a couple of people recently question why I didn't call Connor by his name more. They felt it seemed a bit, well, impersonal. I tried to explain the warped way our family's collective mind works, but I think I failed miserably. So, I'll try here...

"Monkey". This is my Dad, who has been called this by his family since he was four, and his mother saw him jumping on the bed. She said "Louis Edwin, you look just like a monkey!" in front of his brothers and sisters. You can observe the results to this day!

"The Bean". This is my personal nickname for Joélle. No one else calls her this - in fact, I'm the only one that gets to use it. If you try it on her, you face her wrath, so consider yourself warned!!! It started when she was a wee tot and I used to call her "my little Joélly Bean". It just morphed over the years, and is used correctly in the third person. For example, today I would text to her "Hi, The Bean! How's things? I love you, Pops".

"The Boy". This is Connor. I've had two nicknames for him since he was four or five - "Bug Child", which is self-explanatory if you know anything about small boys, and "the boy". It's how I would ask him about his day all his life - "How's the boy today?" Connor has grown up being called "the boy" nearly as much as he's been called anything else, and when I asked him about it he looked perplexed - sort of a "what else would you call me?" kind of look. BTW, I opted to use "the boy" here on the blog because "Bug Child" didn't really ring right for this purpose!

"Fathead". This is me and my brothers, individually. Collectively, we are "Tres Hermanos de Azul". Don't ask.

"Tex". About half the people who know me call me this. I'm working on the other half, but I figure my mom is a lost cause in this regard...

Cherié doesn't get a real nickname - she's far too "Cherié" to be anything else! She is randomly called "Ree" or "Red", but I think she prefers Cherié.

That pretty much sums the whole nickname thing up. Hope it clears things up for everyone!