Sleep Study

 October 6, 2020

On July 29th, Bradley, Eric and I traveled to CHLA for a Sleep Study for Bradley.  Being as things are like they are, Eric had to drop us off at the hospital and then he headed back home.  Seems excessive right?  Actually, there was a master plan to all of it, I promise! On the 30th, Bradley had an Eye Appt at UCLA, the two hospitals are literally 8 miles apart...thirty minutes with traffic, but whatever.  Eric couldn’t stay at CHLA with us, so he went home and slept and then came to get us and be with us at UCLA, because he could be with us there.  Hmmm....  

So the Sleep Study! 

OY!!!  

Actually, Bradley was pretty awesome.  The fact that check in was over a half hour past his usual bedtime, left him a bit less rambunctious than his typical.  Or perhaps, his young mind has finally helped him to accumulate some memories and typically the hospital provides traumatic ones; no matter how hard we all try, so he just remembers and is more sedate there.  But, either way, he was less rambunctious and walked with me without any trouble.  Considering I looked quite similar to those pack mules you see walking down into the Grand Canyon, or even in the Old West movies and games...it was a Blessing that he was such a Super Boy and walked beside me.  I had his Backpack, his food bag, his pillow, his weighted blanket (that gets a pound heavier with every tenth step I want you to know), his weighted stuffed dog that he actually named “Buzz”, and tucked away the secret weapon, his IPad.  Oh and in case you were wondering, Buzz the wonder dog gets heavier after every fifth step.  There’s a science to this and I figured it all out during my wait to get picked up for the Sleep lab and during the extraordinarily long walk to the sleep lab.  

So somewhere around Nine we make it to his room and they provided his plush bed and Mom’s pull out chair bed.  We work on jammies and meds and then the tech comes in to start the painstaking process of attaching about a thousand electrodes to Bradley’s head and body.  And by a thousand I think that I’m pretty close.  He had them on his head, on his chest, under his chin, both legs and I think his arm.  He had straps and monitors that were tracking other monitors because apparently they’ve done this before and know that back ups need back ups as kiddos; Bradley included, like to wriggle out of these monitors and devices.  

And if you weren’t aware, my son is quite certain that when someone touches his head they are quite literally stealing his soul, and he is quite attached to his soul.  For my part, I warned the tech of his issues, and for his Octopus arms.  He said he would do what he could until Bradley went to sleep and do more after if necessary.  Got it. 

So I gave him his movie and he decided he wanted the blanket I brought for myself and shoved the weighted blanket and Buzz, onto my bed.  Mom takes a big sigh... And gives him the secret weapon and he starts watching “Sofia the First”.  Odd.  Why?  He hasn’t watched her in over six months, but he immediately wanted her, maybe he really does connect little Sofia to his sisters.  I’ve always joked and suggested...now I feel I might have a little more science behind me.  

So the tech starts working, and Bradley starts this low wailing.  I call it keening...just a constant and steady cry that was not screaming or ear piercing, but constant.  The electrodes all went on...head, chin, legs, chest, everywhere... and Bradley just kept this constant wail and a bowed head.  As soon as the tech finished, Bradley stopped crying and within three minutes, he was actually asleep.  Ten minutes, they had a reverse cannula around his ears and across his nose to keep track of his breath.  Oh yeah, they kept a camera on him the whole time too.  

We got through the night, ups and downs and only knocked that cannula out once...impressive.  The next morning, I took my little guy with the odd gel in his hair (interesting spikes I might add) down to eat some breakfast while we waited for Dad to arrive and taxi us to UCLA.  Parked in the shade, Bradley and I took small catnaps on the pallet I put on the floor of the van, and we even had a small picnic with our Chick-Fil-A lunch.  Bradley might have left there with yet another admirer in the sweet girl that worked at Chick-Fil-A, but that really surprises no one.  :-) 

We would see the eye doctor and head home after.  

It would be today long to get results from the sleep study.  Bradley and I took off at a very early hour this morning to head back to CHLA.  Bradley would get his weight and height, (60.8pounds - kind of disappointing as that is down and 50.5 inches tall) and then would let the nurse put a pulse ox meter on his finger.  What surprised me the most was when he held out his left arm for her to do his blood pressure.  She put it on and he wasn’t excited about it anymore, but I told him to “Freeze” and he left his arm on his leg and we got I think our third ever BP reading while he was awake.  Exciting!  

So what do we know?  Bradley has moderate sleep apnea.  While we wait to consult with his ENT in November, we will be introducing a CPAP machine that may not get more than de-sensitizing work for the next few months; but theoretically, if his apnea worsened from moderate to severe, he might be better able to tolerate and use the machine.  He could surprise me and be willing and able to use it soon, because lately there is nothing better than surprising mom; OR, he could put the machine in the same category as his hair and we’ll still be doing some soul searching to convince him we are not soul stealing!  I guess we’ll find out soon enough.  

For the most part, a very good day at the hospital.  His realization that he indeed was pretty amazing at the hospital has led him to consider the need to bow to the demands of therapy this afternoon a bit below him and definitely something worth fighting about...but hey - tokens are a life saver when it really comes down to it.  😁😂

Long day and still sitting in the middle of it, so I will close this out and get on to that ever full pile of laundry that haunts me!  Have a wonderful day all!