Sleep Clinic

Gracie and I checked in the Sleep Clinic last night. The accommodations were very nice. Gracie was absolutely thrilled with the large screen tv that was only inches from our bed. Snuggling in bed with mommy while watching the "Curious George" movie is the coolest.

Neither of us were prepared for the full blown EEG leads needing to be attached to her head. I knew there would be some, but for some reason I only thought it would be 4...wrong! The second we walked in the prep room, she knew what was going on and started to run away, when I took her hand to take her in the room she pulled away as hard as she could and fussed. It only went from bad to worse. Gracie is a very strong child and it took three of us to hold her down while another tech put the leads on. I felt so bad, she cried and screamed the whole time. She literally wore herself out.

The night wasn't so bad. Gracie slept pretty well with the exception of when the techs would need to come in to fill in more gel in the EEG leads and when she would wake up and be intrigued by the red light that was taped to her finger.

We were awoken at 6:00 a.m. by the tech ready to take off the leads. This is also traumatic. We did get to watch "Curious George" again when this was going on. After all the leads were off Gracie was in a much better mood and enjoyed eating breakfast in bed while watching TV.

Then it was back home to take a bath and Gracie took a nap before we had to head back to the clinic for the test results. We got some good news and some not so good news. Gracie does not have sleep apnea...YAY!!! I had no clue how we would get her to sleep with a CPAP machine. Gracie has leg movements far too frequent than the normal person...most people have 5 an hour. Gracie has 22 an hour, which many times wakes her up. This may be due to an iron deficiency, so we had a blood test today to check that out. The other not so great news is that the EEG showed wave and spike activity, which can be indicative of seizure activity, although no seizures were witnessed. We were referred to our neurologist who has ordered a full blown EEG on Thursday.

We also had lunch with daddy in the patient cafeteria and that was a big treat as he has been working really long hours and Gracie hasn't seen much of him. When we were all done at the clinic, Gracie and I ran out to Kohls and bought her a few summer things. It is so hard to know what size to buy for her as she grows so fast, but I guessed the best I could and hopefully the clothes will work out.

After Kohls, Gracie took over a two hour nap, but it was later in the afternoon, which made going to sleep tonight a little more difficult. I have a feeling morning will come a little too quickly for her.

Sweet dreams.

Love,
Lisa, Jeff, and Gracie