One Sick Little Baby

Two and a half weeks ago, Jason went to Houston for a training. He decided to take a detour to Utah on his way home for his Grandma Clark's surprise 80th birthday party. While he was gone, all of the kids got a little cold. Just a runny nose and cough. Jude got it on Thursday. By Friday afternoon, he had a fever and he was seeming quite a bit sicker than the other kids had been. Saturday morning, he was very lethargic, and he was breathing quickly and sounding like he was having a hard time getting enough air. I was having a hard time deciding what to do with Jason being out of town. I was a little overwhelmed to think of taking him to the ER with its reputation of long, long waits. I wasn't sure what to do with the other kids. I was talking to my friend, Melissa, on the phone and asked her to listen to Jude's breathing because he was making me nervous. She has two boys with asthma who often get very sick and she immdediately said, "I think he has pnemonia. You need to take him to the ER right away." When she said that, everything just clicked and I kind of started to panic. I felt like I needed him to be seen as soon as possible. Our good friends who are in our branch and live on our street (thank goodness) volunteered to watch the kids while I took Jude in. James gave him a blessing before we left. As Jude laid on the couch for the blessing, his little chest was sucking in and his stomach was pushing out so far with each breath. His entire body would shake each time he breathed. I knew he was sick, but I really had no idea how sick he was. It makes me sick to my stomach now, looking back, how bad it could have been if I hadn't been prompted to take him in when I did. At the ER, I was so scared, I couldn't even think of Jude's birthday to tell the girl at check in. She just stared at me like I was an idiot as I first fumbled for his birthday and then took about a full minute to come up with his birth year. I could not think. There were nine groups of people there ahead of me, but as soon as I sat down they called Jude's name. At first I was relieved to avoid a six-hour wait, but then I realized that being called first meant I had the sickest child there. The first nurse I saw, who took his vitals and checked his oxygen level, just said, "He is a sick little baby." That scared me. His oxygen was at 72. It's supposed to be in the high 90's. As they were taking Jude back, my friend Lina showed up. I had left a completely hysterical message earlier, asking if she could watch my kids while I took Jude in, and she showed up to be with me. I was so grateful. When they got Jude back in the room, he had eight doctors and nurses all working on him at the same time. That's when I started realizing just how sick he was. I was trying so hard to hold it together, but it was the scariest experience I've ever had. It was horrible to watch them stick him with so many needles and have him alternating between bawling and falling asleep. Each new thing they would do to him, he would look over at me and say, "Mama." I felt so bad that I couldn't do anything to help him. Sometimes I wanted to tell them to knock it off, even though I knew they were doing everything to help him. In that first hour or so, he had an IV put in (which took so long for her to find a vein in his chubby arm), blood taken from his other arm, fingers pricked for blood two or three times, a catheter to test his urine, a suppository, x-rays, and various sensors attached to his toe and chest, all the while having to keep a breathing mask over his face which he really hated. After all of this calmed down and Jude was finally stablilized, they told me that he would be admitted to the pediatric ICU for at least 24-48 hours. That's when I finally stepped out to call Jason and completely broke down. I didn't know how I was going to do this without him.

I didn't have my camera the first day, so I didn't get any pictures of him when he looked truly pathetic. This was Sunday when he was starting to look quite a bit better. He wouldn't move that IV arm at all. He played with these toys like this for about 20 minutes and then was so exhausted he promptly fell asleep. At this point, I remember telling Jason that I couldn't imagine Jude running around and laughing or even smiling again. The first couple days, he never smiled.     Until. . .

Sunday evening when he got to eat his first meal since being admitted. He had jello, chicken broth, apple juice and water and he devoured almost every drop. After his meal, he was smiling and laughing and being silly. It was such a relief to see him acting much like his old self again. I missed that smile so much. We spent most of the next couple days sitting in a chair together. My butt was numb from so much sitting. Most days, I don't sit at all until the kids go to bed. 

I was very happy on Monday when they moved him up to the main pediatric floor. He had been off of any oxygen for a day and his oxygen level had stayed near 100. They had pretty much decided that it was a viral pnemonia that he had. They took him off of two of the antibiotics that he'd been started on. There was one more that he'd finish at home. On the upstairs floor, they gave him this darling little pack of toys to keep. It was great, since he was starting to go crazy in there and was sick of all of the stuff that I'd brought for him.

I was trying to introduce Jude to his new dinosaur, "Doug," as the tag says, but he wanted nothing to do with him. He pushed Doug away and is patting Mickey on the head. Granted, this is the Mickey that he himself picked out at Disneyland. He loves his Mickey.

Awww, Doug might just make it in after all.

There's only so much tv an almost 2-year-old can take. We had some much needed play time rolling the ball and truck down the hill of his raised bed.

He hated this sensor on his toe. I felt so bad the first day because he kept lifting up his leg saying, "Toe-y." When I finally mentioned to the nurse that it seemed to be bothering him, she checked it and said it was on pretty tight and she switched it to the other foot. It had left a pretty deep indention on his toe. Poor Jude.

I'm always happy when Jason gets home from a trip, but I don't think I've ever been as happy to see him as I was this time. He got home Monday night at midnight. Jude finally got to come home Tuesday at about 2:00. It was such a long, stressful, scary weekend. I'm so grateful that it's over and everyone is healthy again. I'm also incredibly grateful for all of the amazing friends who helped us take care of the kids and bring in food while I was at the hospital with Jude. Everyone was so willing to help. It's hard for me to ask people to help, but in this case, I had no other choice. I feel so blessed that we have so many great friends here who took care of everything. We love you all!