My poor baby

Yesterday Gage had to go to Mission Childrens Hospital for his EEG. I knew it would be hard on him. He has quite a temper sometimes!

I got a message on Tuesday from Dr, O'Donnell's nurse saying his appointment was set for Thursday at 1:00. She said to put him to bed 2 hours early the night before and get him up 2 hours early so he would be tired. She said it was a sleep study.

On Wednesday, I called the Dr.s office to see if there was anything else I was supposed to do before I took him. The nurse I talked to that day said to take his blanket and teddy bear, and to take some books because we would be there awhile. She said though, to put him 2 hours later than normal and to get him up 2 hours early. She said he needed sleep deprivation for the sleep test. I was a little mad. I hadn't let Gage take a nap all day because I thought he'd have to go to bed around 6 that evening. Now he was tired and still needed to stay up till around 10pm.

He made it to 9 and I went ahead and put him in bed. We got up at 6 the next morning. I had to try to keep him up the entire morning. I was worried that he'd go to sleep in the car on the way there.

We finally made it there (he only tried to go to sleep in the car once and I managed to wake him up as soon as he nodded off) armed with a big sack full of toys, books, his big Mickey Mouse blanket, 2 sippy cups, some cheerios, and his teddy bear. We were prepared to stay all day.  We checked in, and played in the waiting room for awhile. When he got called in, the women that does the EEGs (the EEG technician?) was very nice and put a movie in for him while she put the thingies all over his head (what are those called? Sensors?) I told Gage: alright this is what you've been waiting for, you're so tired. Thinking was going to get to go to sleep. The woman just kinda gave me a funny look but didn't say anything. A few minutes later, she explained what she was going to do, and said it'll only take about 25 minutes to do the test, he can watch TV while we do it.

I was like what? They told me it was a sleep study, that he'd have to go to sleep for the test. I've kept him up for 2 days. She said no, it's not a sleep study. (I could've killed a couple nurses) She did say the sleep deprivation was good for the test though.


Anyway, she started putting the wires all over his head. I knew this wasn't going to be fun. He screamed the other day when a nurse put the thermometer in his ear. Poor little guy cried and cried. I had to hold his hands down. He was saying MamaMamaMama over and over again. I was almost in tears. She finally got them all in. I think it took longer to put those in than it did to actually run the test. She wrapped his head in bandages so he couldn't pull them out. After that was done, he calmed down and watched Blues Clues the rest of the time. I wasn't sure how she would feel if I took pictures of him while we were there but she left for a minute to go get him some prizes for being good so I snapped a couple while she was gone.

 

 

My poor baby looked so pitiful. I did get to hold him the whole time but I couldn't really cuddle him because I was afraid of messing the wires up. 

She finished and made me hold him over the sink to wash all the goop out of his hair. He screamed at that too. He hates getting his head wet. And then she said 'you can go now'. That was it. No answers. Nothing. I said well, I guess the Dr. will call huh? and she said 'Yeah, you should be getting a call in about a week'. 

Really now? It's gonna take a whole week to look at the results. I mean REALLY? 

So, I still don't know anything. It's probably nothing but I don't want to wait a full week to find out whether or not my child is having seizures.

He is acting fine now. He does have a cold but nothing else unusual has happened. But the Dr. said, you wont know if he's going to have another on until it happens. So I guess I'm forced to wait. I hate waiting. 

A bit of a scare

We had a little bit of a scare with Gage Saturday night. We're still not sure what happened but we're waiting to do some tests to see what (if anything) is wrong. Let me start from that morning:

Gage had 2 small rashes on his leg the day before. It didn't look too bad, but I didn't know where it came from. I wasn't too worried though. Gavin is prone to random rashes. My mom said that I did that when I was little.

When he woke up Saturday morning the rash on his left leg looked terrible, big bumpy, rough blisters, and a big spot under his eye that made it look swollen. I was a bit concerned but it was Saturday and while the Dr. office is open, it's only open as long as there are patients coming in. If they don't get any patients, they leave early. I called around 3pm and they were already closed. I still wasn't too worried. I figured it could wait till Monday. He didn't seem to be bothered by it.

He was fine all day. It was warm so we went outside and played for awhile. He napped (not long... maybe 45 min.) It was around 7:30 that evening and I was about to get the boys ready for bed and noticed Gage lying on the rug in the kitchen. He's been pretending to be asleep and you say wake up and he'll sit up and when you say close your eyes, he'll put his hand over his eyes and pretend to snore. I told him to wake up, and he sat up and smiled, then laid back down. We done that about 3 times then I left the room (hubby and Gavin were sitting at the bar right beside him) I come back in a few minutes later and he's lying in the living room floor. Hubby said, Look at that! I thought he'd fell asleep in the floor (he does that if he doesn't nap long enough). I walked over to him and saw his eyes were open so I picked him up, sat him on my lap and said, Gage, are you OK?

About that time, he started throwing up all over the place. I thought, 'Darn, it's gonna be a long night.' But I wasn't too surprised, a virus would explain the rash. Gavin does that every time he gets a stomach bug.

I took him to his bed to get him changed and cleaned up and he starts just rolling from one position to another like he's trying to get comfortable to go to sleep but couldn't. Then his hands started shaking and he grabbed the side of the bed like he was dizzy. Then all of a sudden, while he was lying on his side, His shoulder started twitching really bad, his eyes rolled back in his head, and he done something weird with his mouth. At first I thought it looked like he was smiling but the only way  I can explain how it looked was like a dog, when it's barring its teeth but just on one side... like a snarl maybe? Anyway, I almost freaked. The only thing going through my mind was he's having a seizure. My baby is having a seizure. I got Gavin to go get my husband but by the time he got there, it was over. He was still just lying there with his eyes open but he wasn't seizing anymore. Hubby asked if we needed to go to the hospital, I said I thought so. But we just kept watching him, we were talking about calling my mom and having her meet us there to pick up Gavin when Gage sat up and said 'mama'.

So we decided to watch him a few more minutes to see how he done. He was just lying there acting like he wanted to go to sleep but we didn't want him to go to sleep right then so I took him to the living room and started putting Gavin to bed while hubby stayed w/ Gage. Gavin of course was crying (he normally does at bedtime). I heard hubby say 'Oh nooo'. Gage started throwing up again. I got Gavin laid down and came back in the living room where hubby was in the process of cleaning up more puke (by this time, we were completely out of towels!)

We got it cleaned up and I sat on the couch holding Gage. He seemed to be doing better. He still couldn't sit up or even hold his head up but he was watching TV and he seemed to understand when hubby or I spoke to him. He started having like little twitches every now and then, we were still debating taking him to the ER. My mom called back, she was worried about him ( I didn't mention that I was on the phone w/ her when he started having a possible seizure. I kinda just said something, I don't remember, and hung up on her)

I was telling her that he was doing some better but we still might go on to the hospital when he just sat up and started talking. He wanted to talk to her on the phone and was talking nonstop. Then he wanted to talk to my dad, 'Papaw'. He was jabbering so fast, I couldn't understand him but me and hubby had to laugh. It was like he was a completely different child than 5 minutes before!

He got off the phone and I gave him some water. He sat with his daddy for awhile watching Harry Potter on tv and then got down and started playing like normal. I let him stay up a bit longer and then put him to bed. I kept checking on him after he went to sleep. I would listen to him breathe and think, That is the best sound in the world!

The next morning, he was fine. He acted like his normal little happy self. The rash was still there but not as red as it was. I tried to call the Dr again. They were supposed to have a phone nurse 24 hrs a day but I never reached her. So I had to wait till Monday. Which he was perfectly fine all day.

My pediatricians office has a first come, first serve type clinic every morning from 7:30 to 8:30 where you can just walk in without an appointment. I took him to that, I was 30 minutes early. I didn't want to take the chance of not being seen! I was the second car there!

I check in, get back into a room, and tell the nurse what went on. She asked if there was any family history of seizures. Uh, no, or else I would know what was wrong with him. She went through the regular stuff, allergies, weighing him, taking temperature. (oh, I didn't mention before, the weirdest thing about the whole episode was he had absolutely no fever. He was actually cold to the touch like a cold sweat. He never did run a fever all day)


The doctor came in, I had never seen him before but I recognized his name: Dr. O'Donnell. He asked me to retell everything that had went on (which was a good thing b/c I had forgotten to tell the nurse some of it). He was wonderful. He asked me questions like, when you picked him up, what did he look like. Or when you did this, how did he react. I mean he wanted every little detail which I thought was great. Most doctors I've been to don't do that.

He said that Gage might have had a small seizure, I think he called it a focal seizure. He explained what all that meant. Or he said that he might have just been that nauseous and had been dizzy from puking. Not to mention he was very tired from not napping much that day. But he did say the thing that worried him was the lack of fever and the fact that Gage is the age where they usually see children start having seizures. He said if he would have had a high fever, it could explain more of how he was acting. Calling it something like, a fever seizure which he said could be quite common. If he'd had a fever the Dr. said he probably would've just sent us home. He told me that a lot of times, being sick with something like a virus can bring on a seizure. So he said he thought that it maybe Gage had 2 different things going on. The virus caused the rash (he was sure of that) and then possibly that caused the seizure. He said normally what they would do is send us to a neurologist and do an EEG and an MRI, which would mean sedating him. But since this was Gage's first, the doc said he'd give us the first one free and then if it happened again, we'd have to do the MRI. He was going to talk to Gage's regular doctor first to make sure she agreed and then make an appointment to just do an EEG to see what that tells us. If that comes back normal, we'll just wait and see if it happens again.


They haven't called me back yet for with the date for the EEG but Dr. O'Donnell said if we could get it within 2 weeks he'd be happy. I'm still waiting for that but in the meantime, I'm watching him like a hawk! I sit and watch him play, sleep, whatever. Something scary like that really makes you appreciate healthy kids. I always took it for granted that my kids were healthy and normal. So for now, I just thank God everyday for my babies. I know we don't know what's wrong with Gage yet... hopefully nothing, but I just think of all the children out there that do have serious health problems, and my heart breaks for them and their families. I was terrified when Gage wasn't acting right. I can't imagine how it feels to see your own child with a major problem. I have been praying for those families and hope you will too. Please keep Gage in your prayers too, I don't know what is going to happen, what might have been or is wrong with him, but I'm praying that the EEG comes out fine.

My Uncle

Forgive me if I mistype something or spell words wrong in this post. I'm typing kinda fast because this is hard to write and I figure it I just do it quickly, it'll be easier to get out.

On Tuesday, my uncle (my moms brother) had a massive heart attack. It took the paramedics 30 minutes to get there. His wife tried to do CPR on him until they got there. One paramedic came out and told her that he was gone for her to call his doctor. Then the other paramedic came out and said they she brought him back. They were saying he was without oxygen for about an hour.

They got to the hospital and did surgery to fix his heart which went fine and then he went to ICU. They cooled his body way down, I'm not exactly sure why, and kept him in a coma. The Dr.s run tests on his brain to see what kind of brain damage he had from being w/o oxygen for so long but that it would be 48 hours before they would know anything.

They kept running tests on him and said it didn't look good at all. That if he lived, he wouldn't be the same. The Dr said part of his brain was severly altered. He'd also somehow gotten a staph infection in his nose from one of the tubes in the hospital.

On Friday my niece turned 8 years old so we were having a little party for her when my sister got a call from another Uncle. Everyone had been trying to reach us. My Aunt and my Grandma both called him and tried to tell him but he couldn't make out what they were trying to say because they were so upset they couldn't talk. They said something about he's brain dead and at 1%.

We didn't really know what that meant until later that night when he called back and said that he was definately brain dead and only 1% of his brain is functioning. They were going to pull the plug the next morning.

He was an organ donor so the Dr.s run some tests to make sure all his organs were well enough to take. There's actually a man at Church who only has a few months to live unless he gets a liver transplant so my family called him to make sure he was on the list so he could have my Uncles liver.

It turned out that none of his organs could be used because of both the staph infection and the lack of oxygen for so long. They said that it wasn't worth taking his organs because there was only a 45% chance that they wouldn't be rejected by the recipients body. I hope that makes sense because it was really hard to put it into words.

Anyway, they unplugged him yesterday morning, everybody was there to say goodbye. Well, just the closest family, Mother, Father, wife, sisters, brother, children. My sister went the night before. I didn't go because 1. I didn't want to see him like that, 2. I wasn't that close to him, I only saw him maybe once a year, and 3. No one under the age of 18 is allowed in the hospital right now because of the swine flu thing and there wasn't anyone to watch the kids for me. Hubby had to go to work that night.

They knew he wouldn't die immediately because the 1% of his brain that was working was his brain stem which caused him to be able to breath and made his heart beat. The Dr.s fixed his heart so it was working good. It was just his brain that wasn't working.

I didn't know any of this BTW until last night about 8:30. I assumed he was already gone. My sister called me and said they unplugged him at 8am and he was still alive 12 hours later. And that it could be another 12 hours or 3 days, they didn't know since he was able to breathe.

I hadn't cried at all up until then. It sucked thats for sure but I hadn't cried. After my sister told me that I waited until everyone went to bed last night and I cried. They had him unhooked from everything. No oxygen, no medicine, nothing. I know that's what "unplugged" means but since he was able to breathe, I thought What if that 1% of him thats still here can feel something. What if he's paralyzed and he cant speak or move but he's in pain? That upset me a lot. My mom had assured my sister that his mind was gone and he couldn't feel anything because she had the same concerns as I did. But it still didn't keep me from worrying about it. Who knows what that feels like. I mean, when someone gets unplugged, how can they know that the patient doesn't feel anything. They can't speak, or move, they die. They can't tell you they're in pain. Nobody can know. I can just pray that God was with him and comforted him the whole time. Maybe he was already gone and was watching everyone else that was around him. That's all I can hope for.

I didn't hear anything else until this morning. I went all night wondering if he had died yet. My mom called this morning and said that her, his wife, his 2 stepchildren (his 2 real kids didn't want to see him when he died so they left) my grandparents, and my aunt were all there when he died. The nurse had come in and said that it could be anytime and my mom looked at him while everyone else was looking at the nurse or each other. She saw him take his last breath and she said that was it. He took his last breath and everyone looked at him, and my mom walked out and the nurse asked her "is he gone?"and my mom said yes. I don't think anyone else saw it but my mom. The Drs knew it was coming because they were already suited up outside the door but she was the only one to see him breathe for the last time. It was 10:02 pm EST on October 24th.

She said it was peaceful though. She said if I could have seen him, I'd know that he wasn't in any pain. It just looked like he was sleeping. I guess they had all done their crying all week long because they were peaceful when it happened. I guess we knew it was coming and it's just good it's over. I would've hated to see him stay alive but not be able to live, ya know? I'd rather know he's in a better place than to think of him laying in a bed the rest of his life being hooked up to tubes. It's still hard though. Even though I wasn't real close to him, I still love him. He's my family and I'll miss him. I'll always remember him picking on me when I was little. He's in Heaven with his son, Ryan that died when he was 4 months old. He'd be over 20 years old now.

Here's a picture of the last time I saw my Uncle. It was last year at my Grandparents 50th wedding anniversary. I don't even remember if I spoke to him that day. If I did, I can't remember what it was. He was 50 years old when he died by the way.

OH NOOO...

I knew it was just a matter of time. I just didn't think it would be so soon.  I've tried to do all I could to protect my kids from getting the swine flu. I sanitize shopping carts before I put the kids in. I wash their hands,use sanitizer. I had the kids get the regular flu shot a couple weeks ago. I know it doesn't cover the H1N1 Virus but at least they wouldn't get the seasonal flu, which I think kills more people than the swine flu has anyway.

I knew the boys were getting sick yesterday. They both got up with a cough. So did I. I was thinking it was just a cold. Gavin started to run a low grade fever but I still didn't think a lot of it. Yesterday evening, they both didn't feel well at all. Gavin had a fever of 100.7 degrees. (still no cause for too much worry) I remember thinking oh please Lord, don't let it be the Swine flu. Gage still didn't have a fever and his cough was nowhere near as bad as Gavins, whos isnt terrible anyway. They were both just sick looking. They had bloodshot, droopy eyes, and were laying in a chair watching TV. Which is unusual in itself because they weren't fighting.

Gavin actually moved when he saw the camera, he did have his head on top of Gages looking pitiful!

I gave Gavin some Motrin at 8:30 and put both boys down at 9pm. They both went right to sleep and I thought Ok, they'll be better in the morning.

I was just about to turn everything off and go to bed at 12:30, when Gavin gets up. I thought he was just coming to get in bed with me like he usually does. Then I noticed he was wet. I said 'Oh man!' I changed the sheets and was putting him back to bed when I felt of his head. He was burning up.

He can't put a thermometer in his mouth because he gags on it. It cant even touch his toungue w/o him almost throwing up. He is too ticklish to put it under his arm. He always wriggles and wont sit still long enough to take his temperature. So I have to go in the butt. I haven't had to do it in a long time, he was so hot, and was crying because he didn't want me to do it. I had to fight the poor little guy for 5 minutes to take his temerature. It was 103.1 degrees. It had only been 4 hours since I had given him the Motrin. I wet him down, waited a bit and gave him some Tylenol.

This was him at 1am last night. I was trying to

get him to eat a popsicle. He ate maybe half of it.

We stayed up til 2am and I just put him in bed with me. I didn't sleep well, I kept waking up to check on him and getting up to feel Gage to make sure he didn't have a fever either.

Gavin made it till 7 and got hot again. I gave him more motrin and he went back to sleep. I had to wait until 8:30 to call the doctor but when I did they wanted to see him to check for the flu. I had to wake him up and get him dressed and get him to the dr. office.

It was full so I took him in through the back door that they make you use if you think your kid has the flu or chickenpox. Usually they tell people to use it but today the nurse I spoke to didn't tell me to. I did just in case. The nurse that came back and got him asked if I was told to go in the back way, I just said no I did it just to be safe. The front is always full of little newborns.

When the doctor came in, she didn't seem to think he had the flu. She said it's usually school kids and he had no other symptoms other than the fever and cough and a little bit of a runny nose. She did a test anyway and it came back positive for the flu. :(

Since he had just had the flu shot and they don't run the test for the swine flu, the doctor said she was pretty sure it was the swine flu and perscribed him some Tamaflu. I asked her about Gage and since he still doesnt have a fever she couldn't give him anything. She said if he gets it to just call them back and they'll call in a perscription for some.

The pharmacies around here have a limited supply of the medicine so when I went to my CVS to have it filled she went to check if she had enough. Thankfully she did but she said she barely had enough to give him. He doesn't seem too sick right now. He's been playing all morning like normal. He's a little cranky and tired but he wont take a nap. I've given him the first dose of the medicinebut I think after his nightly dose tonight I may wait and give it to Gage when he gets it. If the pharmacy doesn't have anymore, I think I should wait. The doctor said Gavin is in great health and even told me that if I couldn't get any or didnt want to fill it, he'd be fine. She did say it would be a lot harder on Gage since he's only 16 months and it was a little more dangerous to him if he gets it. I'd hate it if he got it and I couldn't get any medicine for him.

I'm expecting Gage to come down with it very soon. I think I might actually be getting it myself. My eyes have been burning all day, I have a headache and am coughing a bit. Sigh, it's gonna be a long couple of days I think! Wish us luck and pray for the boys that they don't get too bad sick with this. I guess it doesn't matter how careful you are, anyone can get this thing.

Please Pray...

I want to ask everyone to please pray for my husband and his family. Especially his grandmother. Back in May, his grandpa died. Then today we got a call from his grandma that his aunt died. His Grandma has lost a husband and a daughter in 3 months time. His Grandpa was a preacher but all the daughters wouldn't listen to him and none of them go to church. I pray that all this will come to some good and that God will bless that entire family.

His aunt was only in her forties. I hate to say it but she was my favorite! She had a good sense of humor and she liked to laugh. She's the only one that really talked to me and that I could feel comfortable talking to.

They don't know what happened. The person that was supposed to mow her yard found her today. It's still too soon to know anything else. I just want you guys to pray for them please.

Please be praying for my nephew

My mom just called me to let me know how my nephew did at the hospital.

He had Trachomalicia when he was a baby. He had to take medicine for a awhile and they were planning to do surgery when he turned 2 to fix it. He started feeling better though so they didn't do the surgery. He's 4 now, he turns 5 in December. In the past year, he's been getting worse again. He spits up a lot and he can't drink dark drinks because it just comes right back up his throat. They assumed it was still the Trachimalicia so my sister took him back to the doctor and they decided to go down his throat to see what was going on.

That's where he went this morning. They went to the hospital and put him to sleep to take some biopsies to see what was happening. The doctor came back out and talked to my sister when they were done. He said that it's not the Trachomalicia again. He said that did fix itself but that he has a few inflamed spots on the lining of his stomach that could turn into ulcers. That's all I know so far. My sister just called my mom right after they talked to the doctor. They're not even home from the hospital yet. I'll probably have a few more details this evening. The doc said that he wasn't even going to try to say what it is yet. He wants to wait before the biopsies come back on Monday to tell them what's wrong. They have a long week ahead to wait for answers.

I hope and pray that it's something that is easily treatable and not very serious. Poor little guy. I ask that you all keep him and his family in your prayers.