We have spent ENOUGH time in hospitals since we moved to Kansas 5 years ago. Two of the hospital visits were joyous occasions because we ended up with 3 sweet children from those visits. Otherwise, we've had some scary times at Wesley Medical Center.
The morning of April 10th, as we were preparing to take Bruno in to the vet to be put down, I noticed Oliver felt really warm. He had a low grade fever so the nurse at our Pediatrician's office just told me to watch it, and if it got over 100.4 to bring him in. When we returned from the awful, emotional, heart-wrenching vet appointment, I got Oliver out of his car seat and he was burning up. His temp was 101.4, so I immediately called the doctor for an appointment. When the PA that examined him left the room to retrieve one of the doctors, I knew something was wrong. Dr. B examined him and sent us straight to the hospital to be admitted for what he was pretty sure was Meningitis. What a scary word! Of course, the emotion from the morning crept back in, and I totally lost it! I was OK until my favorite nurse walked in the room to give us our hospital instructions. At the sight of her, the lump in my throat let loose, and I made a total emotional fool of myself right there in the office.
I had Kaleb with me, and Kirk was at home with Emery. I left the doctor, stopped by the house to trade kids with Kirk, and headed straight to the hospital with the babies while Kirk packed our bags and then came to the hospital with Kaleb. As soon as we got there, they started poking on my poor baby. The put in an iv, they took lots of blood, they had to insert a catheter to get a urine sample, and then they did a spinal tap. Poor Oliver! They took over an hour for the spinal tap because they had so much trouble getting into the right spot on his spine. I was down the hall because I couldn't watch them do that to my baby. I could hear Oliver screaming from down the hall the whole time. The more he cried, the more I cried.
They informed us that we would have to stay for at least 48 hours so that they could culture the spinal fluid, blood, and urine to find out if he had bacterial or viral meningitis. They started him on broad spectrum antibiotics until they ruled different things out. They also treated him with tylenol for the fever, and they were giving him fluids through his IV just to keep him well hydrated. Thankfully, they didn't have a problem with Emery staying with me in the hospital so that I could continue nursing both babies. She adjusted fine and was a real trooper with most of the attention going to Oliver while we were there. Kirk stayed at home with Kaleb both nights and would come spend the day with us at the hospital. We are so thankful for our friends Brandi and Shelton who took Kaleb the first evening for dinner and play time and all day the next day so that we could concentrate on getting Oliver well! Our friend Molly kept Lucy for us, another friend Kathy delivered lunch to the hospital for us one day, and our friend Ria was on standby to help us any way she could. We are super blessed and will never be able to repay so many people who have helped us since the babies were born!
Oliver was feeling a lot better by the next morning and his condition continued improving over the 48 hours until they sent us home with a viral meningitis diagnosis. As with any virus, we just had to love him through it and let it run its course.
Of course, one of our biggest fears through all of this was that Kaleb or Emery would catch it too. We washed hands like mad every time we touched Oliver, and I tried to keep them on separate sides of the hospital room, but the babies share EVERYTHING. They even share me as a food source, one after the other. I did everything I could to keep Emery from catching it.
When we got home from the hospital after they discharged us, we got everyone fed, bathed, and ready for bed. Once everyone was asleep, Kirk and I were really looking forward to showers and both crashing in our own bed. As I was changing Emery's diaper before putting her to bed, I noticed that she felt pretty warm. After paging the on call doctor for our Pediatric group, I checked her temp rectally and it was 100.4 so we were advised to head to the ER. So... back to the hospital we went with all 3 kids in tow. Thankfully, her temp had dropped some by the time we got there. They checked her out, said she looked fine and sent us home. I don't know if we could have handled another hospital stay!
The next day I started running a fever and felt awful, but I was so happy my kids were ok, I was glad to be the one suffering. Emery ran low grade fevers throughout that weekend, but was fine otherwise. We were all back to normal by mid-week that week and glad to have it all behind us!
This week Kaleb has had pink eye in both eyes. He has been taking his eye drops like a champ and is already much better.
We are SOOOO glad to have April behind us!! And we are really looking forward to a trip "home" to MS this month! We haven't been there in almost a year. We can't wait to see everyone and have our families and friends meet Emery & Oliver!
Melissa
