Ende gut, alles gut.

Dr. Bear sticker, neon sea horse, beany cat, swirly monkey, pink bobble blanket, red heart pillow and one sweet tween with a big, happy heart left Boston Children's Hospital on June 29th at 1:30 PM EDT.

She did it! She is no longer heart-broken. Oh, happy day.

We spent most of the morning preparing to leave. One more X-ray, one more weight check, one more round of vital signs, one more chance to hug Dr. Marx, one more opportunity to say "Good-bye" to Dr. Alexander, and Dr. Kovach (the one with the broken toe) and all the patients and parents we befriended along the way.

Sophia gifted her gigantic heart-balloon bouquet to 2-year old Boaz who we met at the Yawkey Family Inn. He had just come to "the floor" today after his open-heart surgery on Wednesday. He didn't feel too good and she thought that it might cheer him up. And it did. He had never seen a balloon that big.

She also gave nurses Marcy and Danielle one of her big origami hearts with a little thank-you note which they loved. And just like that, it was time to go. 

Superman Stan was at the entrance of the hospital to get "kid and kaboodle". We were free to leave. What a relief. Time to exhale. 

All of a sudden I felt really tired even though we had gotten plenty of sleep last night. Sophia was down for the count from 8 PM to 9 AM this morning. It was actually put into Sophia's chart as a medical order not to wake her for vital signs since she was hooked to a monitor anyway. Thank you, Marcy.

Home - at last. Well, almost.

When we arrived at our new home, Pablito warmly welcomed his daughter who was happy to see her Papi. He had spent the last two days at Stan and Alida's trying to get some work done. Somebody is going to have to pay for these medical bills. :)

One wouldn't be able to tell what this girl had just gone through by looking at her. Well, perhaps the dark rings under her eyes may give away some sleepless nights.

We still can't believe that the deed is done. Our child is fixed. She may even be able to play the piano now. Even though she never knew how to do it prior to the surgery. I told you, only the Petrucci girls can appreciate my husband's sense of humor...

While I'm blogging, sweet Alida is fixing dinner. I don't even have the energy to offer my assistance.

How can we ever thank these two and everyone else who helped us through this? It took much more than a village to get us to this point.

And how can we ever show these doctors and nurses our appreciation for what they have done for our daughter? Especially Dr. del Nido, the miracle worker. No wonder people come from every corner of the world to have their children seen by him.

We never even had a chance to say "Good-Bye" to him. He had to leave for a week-long conference of some sort and we missed him when he came to the room on Wednesday before he took off. I almost cried when I heard that. Out of sheer disappointment.

Sophia sent him a sweet note to thank him again and I'm sure he will appreciate that.

I guess that concludes the telenovella of the Petrucci adventures. Thank you, merci, gracias, Dankeschoen, grazie, אַ דאַנק to all of you who faithfully followed our story, sent comments and well wishes, morally, materially, spiritually and otherwise supported us along the way. We couldn't have done it without you.

And Cathy will send a town car (perhaps with Lily in it?) to pick us up from the airport on Sunday. She wants us to end our journey in style.

Much love to all of you from Sophia, Paul and your faithful blogger Rutchie (AKA asterisk, asteroid, estrella, ostrich, and whatever else you can come up with that resembles Astrid.)

P.S.: Her VT was a random occurrence that scared the night nurse more than anybody else. She was deemed healthy by her EP, Dr. Alexander, who BTW competed with Dr. Marx for the "Crazy Doctor Award," according to Sophia.