Shanghai Sonshine: 4...3...2...1

4 weeks...3 hospital visits...2 surgeries...1 ambulance ride. Tough start to the Year of the Snake!

The day after returning from Vietnam, Zoe headed over to Shanghai United Family hospital in Puxi for surgery on an inguinal hernia. Something done as outpatient surgery in the US, but here you stay one night for monitoring. The surgery went smooth although we did learn a few things about Zoe. When she is scared, she gets mad and when she is mad, she yells. It seemed like she felt this was optional and was all of a sudden just choosing not to...umm not helpful. Thankful it was ~24 hours total for her from admission to going home! Everything from having to put on the hospital gown to IV needles to not being released as early as she wanted upset her...kind of draining for all of us. Have a few things to work on coming out of this experience!

On the flip side is Abigail who one week later headed down to Hong Kong with Andy for surgery on a perforated ear drum. For Abigail, it was an adventure and, with apparently a high tolerance for pain, she didn't mind any of it! Strangely her surgery was scheduled at 7pm so she only needed to start fasting at Noon. She then spent two nights in the hospital with amazing views and very loose rules. On the second day (surgery the night before) the nurses told Andy they could leave the hospital if they wanted (go sight see, out to eat, etc) just needed to come back to spend the night. So, it was kind of just like their hotel. As Joseph would say, "That's weird". And for Abigail, she actually wanted to be at the hospital - watching Disney channel (something we don't get here) and playing card games with Andy. On the third day they were released and headed home...via train! 20 hours in a soft sleeper car with 2 middle-age Chinese ladies (Abigail & Andy on top bunks, Chinese ladies on the bottom). Very normal & common in China to share a car with perfect strangers. Andy & Abigail...they did their best to spend as little time in the sleeper cabin as possible! Much time in the dining car (where apparently the food wasn't all that bad) and in the passageway (reading books, doing word search).

Ambulance Ride!

And finally, our unplanned adventures this week with Joseph. As you may recall Joseph has epilepsy and Tuesday had his first seizure in over 14 months (it has been such a blessing that he had gone that long!). Assumedly the seizure was actually triggered by his fever that spiked to 103. When he wasn't recovering from it as normal, Andy took him to the hospital. Outside of the fever still, everything else had returned to normal however they decided to admit him to monitor him - which did mean once his fever came down, they needed to transfer him from PuDong (the west side of the city where we live) over to their main hospital in Puxi (the east side of the city & about 45 min away). By this time Mr Xu had picked me up from work and I was at the PuDong hospital with them. So Andy, Joseph and I get in the ambulance (after Joseph gives Mr Xu a hug) and Mr Xu gets in his car and we all head to Puxi. We quickly notice that we have not taken one of outer ring roads but have gone straight through the city and then we aren't even on the main elevated roads in the city but are on little side streets sitting in traffic, going really slow. Now we had read about ambulance scams before...just never thought we'd live one. So we FINALLY get to the Puxi hospital and of course Mr Xu has been there for a long time and he is FURIOUS! He begins to yell at the ambulance drivers and tells us not to pay them anything (here in China the ambulance service is paid in cash immediately following your ride). They follow us into emergency, Xu still yelling at them, them asking us to sign stuff, us not signing anything and just trying to focus on Joseph. They follow us up to the pediatric floor and eventually right into Joseph's room. At this point our objective is to just get rid of them...so we pay them only what the PuDong hospital said it should cost (still more than they deserved!) and they finally leave. Had it not been for Mr Xu, we are certain they would have asked for significantly more money because it took them so much time. Once again thankful for Mr. Xu! So Joseph gets blood drawn (not fun, but as soon as it's over he says "I'm okay. Thank you". Then has a chest X-Ray that reveals pneumonia. So now we're thanking our heavenly Father for the seizure that caused us to go to the hospital so this could get caught so early. 2 nights in the hospital, lots of breathing treatments and IV antibiotics do the trick (along with lots of meds & inhalers sent home with us too!). We do believe that Joseph was probably the most favorite patient on the floor...he was so friendly, very inquisitive, always said thank you to the nurses & cooperated (even when it hurt!)...and of course sometimes he would just look and give them that smile with those chubby cheeks and melt their hearts!

Definitely knew God was watching over His precious kiddos as they went through these journeys. We had lots of prayers coming from the West & the East (the little girls elementary classes have been very faithful at praying for the planned and unplanned events!)...and are grateful for them and all of you!