October 14, 2006
What a week we’ve had here at the Perkins house.
A week ago today we were in Abilene spending the long
weekend with Drew’s family. We went to Nelson Park to do the Heart Walk (in
honor of the other Canon) and had a great time. Canon loved getting to see the
LifeFlight (or whatever it’s called) helicopter there from the hospital. He
got to get up in it and he and Drew visited with the pilot. We’ve seen
countless airplanes, but this was his first up-close helicopter – definitely a
red-letter day! 
After the walk we went to the Abilene Zoo, which is SO GREAT! We had the double stroller with us, but both of the boys were so excited that the stroller wasn’t going to cut it for long! I took the boys to the Abilene Zoo last September when Creed was just a few weeks old, but this was Creed’s first conscious zoo experience. We loved watching him point to animals and say, “Zat?” (what’s that?) Canon rushed along the sidewalk, hollering out animals’ names as he saw them. “Bears, Mommy, bears! See them!” I tried to put together an educated sentence to challenge his animal knowledge, something like, “Yes Canon, those bears are black. Do you think they get hot with all that fur?”, but my attempts were mostly futile because he was already two exhibits past me by the time I would have finished it. It became quite a joke how disinterested he seemed to be in following any sort of mapped-out course for the exhibits. He’d go to the right, then the left, then across the grass, then backtrack to the bridge… I could see that he was really stretching his daddy’s left-brained nature! I can just imagine Drew calling to Canon, “Son, come back! It makes more sense to see the jaguar before we go to the elephants!” I’m teasing Drew, of course! He had a blast, despite the blatant lack of a preconceived tour plan! Canon’s zoo favorites – flamingos (“mingos”), giraffes, and turtles. Creed’s top picks – giraffes, ducks, and butterflies.
Giraffe from Abilene, meet Creed and Canon from Amarillo.
Since we had Monday off for Columbus Day, our Sunday was nice and leisurely without having to pack up and worry about what time to leave and fighting the Sunday-driving-sleepies. MamaLu and Daddo wanted to take the boys to Gattiland for pizza after church. It was a special treat that Bev (Drew and Casey’s honorary grandmother) was able to meet us there and hug on the boys, too (Canon, Creed, Drew, and Casey). At one point while we were sitting at our table, someone interrupted the music playing on the speaker to say, “So-and-so, your special order pizza is now ready at the buffet.” Canon, well-trained in drive-thru ordering by our frequent morning trips to Sonic for a Dr. Pepper, responded by raising his eyes to the speaker on the ceiling and calling out loudly, “I want a… pizza, please!” We could barely contain our laughter! I told them that lately when we drive up to the order menu at Sonic he calls out from the backseat, “I need a… Dr. Pepper, please…” and then he follows up closely with a “No, thank you!” because inevitably they ask you if you want mozzarella sticks or tater tots with that and I always say… “No, thank you.” It cracks me up every time! I guess I should be thrilled that he seems to be adequately picking up these important life skills!
Monday we left, after visiting MamaLu and Daddo at work for a little bit. Creed starting running some fever that morning, so he was a bit mopey, but we picked up some Motrin for him and he seemed to act like he felt better as the day wore on. Drew dropped the boys and me off in Lubbock to stay with his aunt, Patti, and he drove on back home. Canon had two doctors appointments at Covenant the next morning, so I had taken Tuesday off. That night we went to LCU and picked Bradley up and took him with us to eat more pizza. Then we went to the mall to visit Taryn at work for a bit, play in the indoor park-thing, and coo over the puppies in the pet store.
Our appointment with Dr. Higgins was great. He’s made a big jump in weight and he’s now in the 25th percentile! Yea! We had kinda set up camp in the 5th-10th % lately. Then we met with Dr. Evans, pediatric neurologist, who wants Canon to be doing PT/OT twice a week to recover the muscle tone in his shoulders and upper body. I’ll keep you updated on that.
We drove back to Amarillo Tuesday right after lunch and plopped down at home around 3:30. Creed continued to need Motrin that evening and it started becoming clear that whatever had a hold of him wasn’t going to let go without a fight. That night is when the croupy coughing started. Wednesday morning, Drew decided that he would take Creed to see Dr. Young, and then stay home with the boys while I went ahead to school in the afternoon. The diagnosis was respiratory infection with croup. They gave him a breathing treatment at the office, then my poor, sweet Creed took a shot in the thigh and for the rest of the day was not happy, understandably, unless he was being held by Mommy or Daddy. That night was quiet, but Canon woke up the next morning running a fever of 101. So… I took the day off trying to get rid of the fever with Tylenol. He acted like he felt fine, so I thought it would be a quick thing. But he woke up from his nap running 102, so Drew met me at Dr. Young’s office to help with Creed while we let them take a look at Canon. By that time, Canon was miserable, so hot with fever that I had to take his shirt off. He was trying to sleep in my arms, but was moaning and making little achy movements constantly. After noticing that his throat was pretty raw, Kathy (the P.A. that we love) ordered a rapid strep test that came back positive. So, in an attempt to kill the strep as fast as possible, we opted for the penicillin shot. The rest of the night was pretty awful for Canon. He did NOT want to watch a movie, he did NOT want a popsicle, or anything else that we suggested. He only wanted to curl up on the couch and open his eyes every once in a while to be sure that Mommy and Daddy were still right there with him. We’ve all been there.
I called in a sub for Friday, and went to bed that night worried about Canon. But I woke at about 7:45 with Canon standing next to my bed saying “Hi Mommy,” very softly. I was so happy that he seemed to be feeling so much better! He was still feverish, but it was low-grade all day and he obviously felt like himself again. But, when Creed woke up and we walked in his room to get him out of bed, he greeted us with a horrible hacking bark. It got progressively worse throughout the day. After listening to his persistent naptime pattern – two minutes of silence, croupy coughing fit, three cries, two minutes of silence, another coughing fit, three cries, etc.- I quit arguing back and forth with myself about how he just saw the doctor two days ago and I gave in to my gut. I called Dr. Young’s office again to tell them that he was worse instead of better. So, for the third day in a row, we loaded up and went to the doctor’s office. This time Drew met us there and just took Canon on home so he didn’t have to go back into the waiting room. Dr. Young listened to his breathing and said that, basically, the shot he got two days ago was a 48 hour shot. And, evidently it had worn off before the infection died. So, for the third day in a row, one of the boys got a painful shot in the thigh. The evening was manageable; the challenge was trying to keep them away from each other’s sippy cups and breathing space. But last night was pretty bad. At around 1 a.m. Creed started repeating his naptime pattern. I ended up running a hot shower in our bathroom and holding him in there with me. At first I threw a couple of pillows and a blanket on the bathroom floor and tried to lie down with him, but he was not happy with that plan. I ended up sitting on the floor rocking him. He fell asleep in there after about 10 minutes, but I stayed in the steam for about 45 minutes total. I just figured the longer I could keep him in there, the better. Amazingly, I didn’t hear another cough out of him for the rest of the night.
They’re both doing well today. We have stayed in and will probably keep them home tomorrow just to be sure that they have a couple of completely well days under their belt before we get back into our routine next week. I just pray that this week has strengthened their immune systems enough to fight off whatever floats around for the rest of the season!
In other news, I’ve been very emotionally involved with the status of the other Canon, the one who just received a heart transplant in Little Rock. This week he was featured in his local paper, the Cabot Star-Herald. I was able to find the article and what I read simply broke my heart. In contrast to our Canon, who lived the first year and a half of his life without any pain due to his condition, Canon Norman has been through an absolute mess of surgeries, hospitals, procedures, etc. for the whole of his four years. The transplant came only after it was determined that Canon’s heart was not able to withstand the stress of the next surgery that his condition demanded. It sounds like he and his mom have pretty much lived in the hospital for about a third of his life. No wonder she has written in her journal that “I just want Canon to get a break”. Lately, every prayer we’ve prayed in our family (and our extended family, too) has brought Canon Norman’s name to God. We’ve shared his name and situation with every praying person we know. Andrew Canon and Canon Andrew… it’s just uncanny, I think. God knew to connect us to him so that we could help them in some way. Maybe it’s through keeping up with his mom, Carla, through their website and offering support that way and through the emails that we’ve traded a couple of times. Maybe I’m just supposed to continue spreading the word so that others will remember him in prayer. Maybe it’s something else… I will keep asking God to show me what to do. I realize now how powerful the connection was between our Canon during his transplant journey and SO MANY wonderful strangers. I can list five people off the top of my head – Laura, Coach Spano, Rita, Jamie, Tiffany, Mona, Dawn, Karla… see that’s eight people that I have never met who feel like family to us now because of the support they offered us on a day by day basis (well, I’ve actually met Dawn and keep in touch with her here in Amarillo, but she was a stranger before), and I really could go on and list more. That’s who I am to Canon Norman’s family – a stranger. But I don’t feel like one; and I know that the people above don’t feel like strangers either. How powerful God is to connect His people not always by blood relations or proximity or history, but by the stories in our heart.
Last Monday as we were getting our things packed up to leave Abilene, Creed fell asleep. I carefully laid him on the couch and went to the other room to get a blanket for him. When I returned, I saw that Canon had crawled up next to him. He was holding Creed’s hand and whispering “night, night Creed, shhh…” I wish I had grabbed my camera before he turned his head back to the tv!