Yay, Long Weekend??

So, highly abbreviated version of the last week in NICU-land:

Neonatologists agree with parents that this kid needs to go home. With oxygen if needed, that's no big deal, but he's no longer getting anything but annoyance and interrupted sleep in the NICU. 

Cardiologists: It's not my story to tell and I only have snippets, but:

The first guy was calm and reassuring and said it'll all sort itself out, but he's a boss and not one of the doctors who sign off on stuff. 

The second guy who does sign off on stuff also said this issue can sort itself out in time, then the second guy revisited with a different perspective and wanted to do surgery on Tuesday of next week. WTF?? Nothing had changed between meetings. There was other weirdness in that meeting, but he wil not be the cardiologist going forward.

My daughter came home from that meeting pissed off, and no, he's not having surgery next week. Everybody else is moving forward with sending this kid home with his parents so he can sleep in his own bed for the first time, and wear his own jammies and eat when he's hungry and sleep when he's tired, and not get poked and prodded and tested at all hours, and get fed on somebody else's schedule. Further testing will be outpatient, after he gets a chance to just sleep and eat and get cuddled and be a two week old baby, FFS. He's not in any sort of dire condition, he's on bare minimum oxygen and nothing else, no meds, no tubes other than the nasal cannula, no nothing. He needs to sleep and eat and be a baby and let his body decompress from 24/7 hospital shit.

There was a wine-fueled (at least on my end) laughing and ranting call from my daughter while they were preparing dinner at 9 pm, but the bottom line is that the NICU doctors are all in favor of sending him home with oxygen if needed, it's obvious he doesn't need to be there and should have been sprung days ago. And they'll be getting second opinions about next steps for damn sure.

So the process of extracting him from the tender mercies of our 'Murrican health care system has begun, but yanno, it's a holiday weekend and all, so if he gets extracted before Tuesday it'll be surprising and wonderful. Insurance company has to agree he needs oxygen, for one thing, because this is "Murrica, Fuck Yeah!" and doctors don't make our health care decisions, insurance companies do. DO NOT GET ME STARTED, PEOPLE. I HAVE DECADES OF PENT UP RAGE. And a grandson trapped in this shitshow, so yeah.

Sending in the middle school SWAT team is starting to seem like an option. AND I just keep reminding myself that the parents in this case are two 40+ professionals with 6 degrees and various professional certifications between them in fields adjacent to health care, and it's hard and exhausting and stressful for them. How do "regular folks" do it? The answer is they often don't, and that's why there are bake sales and fundraisers for sick kids in this country and bankruptcy due to medical bills is just a thing that routinely happens with a sick child or spouse.  'MURRICA! FUCK YEAH!

In other news, I had a quiet week at work and decided to take today off, and got more lingering petty tasks taken care of in three hours than I did on my "vacation," or the past month. Now I'm going to go sit my ass on the couch and finish binging Killing Eve. It's on Amazon Prime now so I'm catching up. And there will be much crocheting/knitting/and a measured amount of wine.