Nora

She’s still relatively stable like yesterday, and she still appears comfortable.

I’ll update next (or at least try to) if this changes.

Her state is similar to yesterday this morning.

She is so loved.  The Young family arrived yesterday from Vancouver, and there were visits from the Parkers and friends, like some of Nora’s best buddies Oskar, Tristyn & Lyla.

And taken care of.  The nurse and doctor were here to check on her, and advise Dylan and I on how to continue to make her comfortable.

 

We weren’t sure she’d make it through last night — she did, but it is very unlikely that she will wake up again.  Her breathing has stabilized but it is much weaker.  She is in her room, always with one or more of us, and relatively peaceful.

Her decline over the past few days has been more rapid than anyone expected — even the doctor who said on Wednesday that things could start moving quickly.  It’s hard to believe that on Thursday morning she was at the hair salon, giving the hairdresser thumbs up for the super short new hairstyle.

We know how much love is felt for her — hopefully she does too.  Honestly, it’s the only thing that is keeping me going right now.  Family are coming this afternoon from afar, and it may be possible for friends to quietly stop by too.

 

There’s been further decline the past few days.  The doctor said on Wednesday that it’s possible that it moves quickly from now on, and today she’s having a lot of difficulty breathing, making it even more clear that she doesn’t have much longer.  Very hard times at our house right now.

Depending on how she is feeling over the weekend, we may want visitors coming by for a very short time to remind her that she is loved.

Kate has been spending some time with her sister, but mostly seeming to want to pretend like this isn’t happening.  This was yesterday morning.

 

Nora has been having a lot of headaches and more nausea, so has been feeling worse.  Luckily,  she’s had a very special visitor to lift her spirits.

A couple weeks ago, I asked Nora if she wanted to FaceTime with her baby cousin (18 month old Zion) in Costa Rica, whom she has never met.  She declared that, no, she wanted to hug and cuddle him.  So, I emailed her Aunt Karen to see if this was possible.  Coincidentally, Zion had JUST received his Canadian citizenship and Karen and Jonah (Zion’s dad) quickly got all the documents arranged.  Zion is now HERE, in Toronto, adding lots of well needed sunshine (and hugs) to our household.   He arrived Sunday and leaves Thursday.

We’re going to try out this blog for keeping folks up-to-date on Nora.  I’m wishing we started it back when we had lots of adventures to share; instead, unfortunately, most of the posts will not bring happy news, and some will be brief.  I will try and post some of those memories, but for now I’ll start with a recap on yesterday, Halloween.

Sorry if we offend folks, but Dylan and I have never been a fan of Halloween, and this year was exceptionally hard.  While everyone tried to make the most of the day for Nora, it was an extremely difficult example for her that she can’t just be a normal kid (e.g., go trick-or-treating)…

The morning included visits from teachers dressed up in their costumes (Ms. Turco, Mr. Harris, Mrs. H, Tiffany & Biljana).  Ms. Turco also brought a beautiful photo album full of photos of Nora at school.

The pictures started from when she was in her kindergarten class, like this one.  Beautiful, but very emotional…

In the afternoon, the entire school did their Halloween dances across the street from our house, so Nora could watch from our front yard, dressed up in her costume, too.

She was hesitant during the day to the activities, but by night she was really unhappy.  We offered her several options for trick-or-treating but she refused, and didn’t want to put her complete costume back on.  Some friends stopped by to say hello while they were trick-or-treating, but sadly she wasn’t interested.