We’re Home
In support of
The Weilnhammer Family
View Support Registry
The Weilnhammer Family
Coming home after seven weeks in the hospital has been a much stranger experience than we expected.
When we walked through the door, everything looked exactly the same. All of our belongings were right where we left them. Nothing had physically changed. And yet somehow it didn’t feel like home.
It’s hard to explain that feeling unless you’ve lived inside a hospital for a long time. For seven weeks, that hospital room became our entire world. It’s where we slept, where we worried, where we watched monitors and waited for labs, where we celebrated small victories and held our breath through harder moments. Our lives were structured around doctors, nurses, feeds, medications, and the constant rhythm of medical care.
Now that we’re back home, our brains just haven’t caught up yet. Our nervous systems adapted to a world that we are no longer in, so home feels disorienting even though it’s the place we’ve been longing to return to.
Despite this, we can visibly see how happy Camila is to be back in her space. She slept incredibly well last night, better than she has in a long time. She has been happily playing with her toys and rediscovering things she hasn’t seen around the house for some time.
Her favorite toy right now is her DJ booth, so it’s essentially Club Weilnhammer at our house.
At the same time, she wants me very close by, and that makes a lot of sense. She is more attached as her brain re-establishes a sense of safety after such a stressful experience. It’s simply instinctual for her to keep me nearby while her nervous system settles again.
So what we’re seeing in Camila is actually something really encouraging. She feels safe enough to play, laugh, and explore but she also wants to keep me close while her world resets. And honestly, we’re doing a bit of the same thing.
Our home will feel like home again. We’ll find our rhythms again. For now, we’re just soaking in the quiet moments, the sound of Camila playing with her toys, and the simple joy of being under our own roof again.
Before we close this update, we just want to say thank you. The support we have received during these past seven weeks has meant more to us than we can adequately put into words. The messages, the prayers, the encouragement, the meals, and the generosity have carried us through some very long days and nights.
It truly takes a village to walk through something like this, and we have felt that village around us every step of the way.
As we transition home, we are realizing that this next phase is still a period of adjustment. If you’ve been wondering how to support us during this time, continued encouragement, meals, errands, or simply checking in would mean so much as we navigate this transition and help Camila keep moving forward.
You can sign up for a meal drop-off in the calendar on our Support Now page. If you don’t see a day that might work for you, please just reach out to Frankie or I.
You can sign up for a meal drop-off in the calendar on our Support Now page. If you don’t see a day that might work for you, please just reach out to Frankie or I.
We look forward to continuing to provide updates on Camila’s progress now that we are home.
With love,
The Weilnhammer Family
Comments
Susan Zondor
Mitch VanSumeren
Megan Reilly
Michael Reilly
Leslie Stiles
Mary Reilly