"These are wonderful," said Buffy Freeland, the mother of 7-month-old Desiah, as she accepted a tiny pajama outfit for her daughter, who suffers from acid reflux disease. "Anything to brighten up the morale of children who are sick, make them feel better about being in the hospital."
Desiah, her mother said, has been hospitalized five times and made 15 emergency-room visits because of her condition, which often causes respiratory distress when she aspirates food or fluid into her lungs. Nevertheless, the baby, who was being fed through a tube in her nose, smiled readily at her visitors yesterday and chuckled when someone made a funny face.
"Little children suffering is something terrible, it's sad," Freeland said, looking into her daughter's face. "But it makes you feel good when you're pretty, right?"
Walking into another room, Becky Wimsatt, a child-life specialist who focuses on helping children cope with hospitalization, announced cheerfully to a 2-year-old girl, "Got some new PJs! There you go!"
Wimsatt clearly believes in the power of a positive outlook, even when children are about to be wheeled into an operating room. Much of her approach, therefore, involves play - as frequently as possible. "If you're playing with a syringe by using it as a water gun," she said, "it's not so scary."
Yesterday she brought a smile, if only briefly, to the face of a 19-year-old mother, Stephanie Tyler, by handing her a set of bright green pajamas decorated with dinosaurs for her 16 1/2 -month-old son, Cameron Miller. Suffering from an infection of the lymph nodes in his neck, Cameron was asleep and oblivious to the act of kindness.
"They look big, but they'll be fine," his mother said, evidently touched but ill at ease in the surroundings. "It's good because we didn't bring pajamas here for him. I brought his favorite stuffed animal - Eeyore from Winnie the Pooh - and his Thomas the Tank Engine blanket, but no pajamas."
Dearius Cameron, 6, lucked out. Not only did he get a blanket with a grinning Lightning McQueen - the racing ace from the movie Cars - but he also received blue pajamas that showed zooming race cars. To top it off, Dearius, who suffers from sickle cell disease, was being released from the hospital.
His wide smile, punctuated by a missing tooth at its center, said it all. But when Garner asked him whether he planned to have a pajama party at home, he said uncertainly, "No."
"That's OK," Garner said. "You're going to have pleasant dreams when you wear these tonight."
nick.madigan@baltsun.com
