Greg's 1st trip to the Emergency Room

On Wednesday May 26th, I noticed that Greg had a runny nose. It was totally clear so I wasn't worried. He also had a little cough, which he's never had before. It was a dry cough and it didn't seem to bother him so I gave him a couple doses of over the counter cough medicine and didn't think much of it. That night, I put him to bed only to be awakened at 2:30 am by his cries. I rushed into his room and lifted him out of his crib. He had snot all over his face and felt like he was burning up. I took his temperature and it was 103.3. Not good. His cough now sounded like it was loaded with phlegm and he seemed to be struggling to breathe through the congestion and cough. I was up with him in the rocking chair all night. Greg would fall asleep but within 20 to 30 minutes like clock work, he'd wake up needing to cough and then start the crying cycle all over again. This went on all night.

When Andrew woke up Thurs morning, I told him about the nights events and he suggested that I be at Greg's pediatrician's office at 8:30 right when they opened. I didn't think that was the best idea (showing up without an appointment), and told Andrew I'd call right when they opened. We were both worried about Greg and Andrew insisted that I take him to straight to the doctor without waiting until they opened to call first. Being as Greg hadn't let me put him down once, I asked Andrew if he'd come with us which he did. I sat in the back seat with Greg as Andrew drove us to the pediatrician's office. We got there at 8:28 am, walked in and explained that we didn't have an appointment but that Greg needed to see a doctor. As I thought, they said they could see him right then, and that the earliest a doctor could see him was 9:30....a whole hour from then! The receptionist got a nurse to come talk to us and she suggested we take him to urgent care or the ER. Since our urgent care co-pay is $75 and our ER co-pay is $250, we headed to the urgent care right by our house. After completing the paperwork, we were led into the triage room where a nurse tried to get Greg's vitals. He wouldn't keep the oxygen monitor on his finger and resisted standing on the scale. He didn't want me to put him down and didn't want anyone touching him that wasn't his Mama. Poor baby. He laid his head on my shoulder and was just moaning with every exhale. It was so sad. So the doctor came in, took his temperature and checked his ears. He ruled out an ear infection and then wanted to do a chest x-ray. Since I don't know if I'm pregnant yet, I had to let Andrew go with Greg to do the chest x-ray. Greg screamed as Andrew pried him from my arms and I felt tears well up in my eyes as they walked down the hall and I could hear Greg screaming "Mommy!" all the way. It only took a few short minutes but hearing Greg's cries from all the way down the hall ripped my heart out. They came back in the room and Greg lunged for me. Content to be back in my arms, we sat and waited for the doctor to come back in. He came back in and said Greg didn't have pneumonia, but had us come look at the chest x rays so that we could better understand what he was explaining to us. Basically, Greg had some a little junk in his lungs, a viral infection and he prescribed amoxicillan and sent us on our way.

We filled the prescription and headed home. Greg has never had any issues with taking medicine so I wasn't worried about giving it to him but this time was totally different than any previous attempts. He fought us tooth and nail, with every ounce of his strength. We tried everything. We explained that he needed to take some medicine to help him feel better and offered it to him in the little cup. Nothing. After that didn't work, one of us held him down while the other tried to administer the medicine with a syringe. We tried shoving it way back in his mouth, tried in the corner of his mouth, under the tongue, in his cheek, tried plugging his nose to force him to swallow, tried blowing in his face, nothing. With each attempt, Greg was screaming and spitting before the syringe even got to his mouth. Each time we tried, the medicine would be sprayed back in our faces with the remainder running down his chin and neck. It was just heartbreaking to have to force it on him when he was obviously terrified. After a couple attempts I said, "that's it." I was done. I just couldn't continue to do this to my child. I was close to tears each time we tried to force it on him. I just couldn't do it. So instead, I just held him, rocked him, smoothed his hair, rubbed his back, talked to him and did anything I could to soothe him. He refused to eat or drink anything all day and I was starting to worry about dehydration.

I literally held him ALL DAY on Thursday and was up ALL NIGHT with him again that night. By this time, I was exhausted and was beginning to feel cold like symptoms myself (congestion, runny nose and a sore throat). At about 12:30 am on Friday morning, Greggy started vomiting. The vomiting continued until about 4:00 am and was just awful. We both had several changes of clothes that night and I spent the night going between trying to lay with Greg in our bed (Andrew was sleeping in the basement), sitting up in the recliner in the family room, and sleeping on the floor next to Greg's crib. At precisely 8:30 am, I called his pediatrician's office and asked for the earliest appointment of the day. They said they could see me at 9:00 so I threw my hair in a pony tail, brushed my teeth and was on my way to Parker with my sick little boy in the back seat.

The pediatrician did a very thorough exam. She said he had a lot of wax in one of his ears and thought that maybe it might be an ear infection after all. So with the help of another nurse, we held him down again while she worked to clean out his ear. Poor Greg. He hated it. He thrashed wildly and screamed the whole time. It was all we could do to hold him down. After cleaning out his ear, she concluded that it looked normal and ruled out an ear infection. She thought that this was probably something viral but was worried about dehydration. She left the room to consult with another doctor and then came back in, recommending that we head over to the Sky Ridge hospital ER for blood work and IV fluids.

I called Andrew at work and filled him in and we agreed to meet at the ER. After seeing how combative Greg had been with the 2 doctors that had already seen him, I was terrified of how he'd react to the blood work and IV. I was running on no sleep for the past 2 nights. I was exhausted and my heart was breaking for my child as he was hurting and we didn't know why or how to help him.

We arrived at the ER and filled out the paper work. At this point, it was Friday morning and Greg hadn't had anything to eat or drink since Wed evening. We took a seat in the waiting room and in his weak little voice, Greg looked up at me and said "snacks please." I was thrilled that he was asking for something to eat so I hurried over to the vending machine and breathed a sigh of relief to see that they took credit cards! I quickly bought a bottle of water, some pretzels and some Cheese It crackers and went back to the waiting room. I offered Greg a pretzel and he gingerly took it and took a teeny tiny bite. I was so happy!

Soon after, Andrew arrived and then we were called into a room. The pediatric doctors and nurses in the Sky Ridge ER were AWESOME! We told them the course of events over the last 2 days and what the Urgent Care Dr and the pediatrician had said. When it came time for his blood work and IV, the nurse did a wonderful job. They wrapped him up like a little burrito - swaddling him tightly just like an infant except for the arm that would have the IV. Then, she was able to get the needle in with 1 try and use the same need for both the blood draw and the IV. Greg did cry quite a bit, but it was a much easier process than I had anticipated. Once that part was over, I breathed a sigh of relief. He was not happy about the IV and cried the whole time we were there saying "take it off, take it off!" After spending several hours in the ER and Greg getting 2 doses of IV fluid, we got to go home. All his blood work came back normal (except for being dehydrated which we already knew about) and the doctor in the ER agreed with the Urgent Care Dr and the pediatrician that this was something viral. Both the ER doc and the pediatrician said to stop the amoxicillin, that it wasn't necessary, which we were grateful for too!

We got home from the ER early Friday afternoon and then settled back into the previous day's routine. Greg would not let me put him down. When Andrew got home that evening he had to pry Greg away from me just so that I could finally take a shower! Then, last night didn't go much better than the previous 2 nights. We started off in my bed until after tons of tossing and turning, Greg fell out of bed at midnight. So then we sat in the recliner for a bit, rocking and cuddling. After my back was killing me and I was desperate to lay down and try and get some sleep, I tried to put him to sleep in his crib while I made a little bed on the floor next to it. Again, he wanted nothing to do with it. So I got the toddler bed rail, put it on Andrew's side of our bed, grabbed extra pillows to barricade Greg in and went back to our bed. Greg did end up sleeping for a couple hours, but continued to toss and turn. He woke up every hour needing to cough and then proceeded to cry for awhile before falling back asleep. This was the 3rd night of me not getting any sleep and I was getting a bit delirious. At 6:00 am, Greg woke up coughing and crying and refused to let me put him down on the bed next to me. He literally insisted on being on my lap....physically on me. I tried to hold him while finding a somewhat comfortable position that I could rest in but it just wasn't happening. By this time, I had a fever and was feeling full blown sick, running on zero sleep. So after trying unsuccessfully several times to lay him next to me and enduring a full blown punching, scratching and kicking fit, I was done. I took him back to his room, gently laid him in his crib and explained that he needed to sleep in his own bed since he wasn't being nice in Mommy's bed. He screamed for almost an hour, climbed out of his crib and finally fell asleep on the floor next to his door. After listening to the screaming and knowing that he was out of his crib, I was finally able to fall asleep at almost 8:00 this morning. I slept until 10:00 when I heard Greg up again. 2 hours of uninterrupted sleep in my bed was fabulous! So that's what I've been operating on all day today.

Thankfully, Greg decided he wanted to eat and drink again today. His appetite seems to be back to normal and while I couldn't get him to drink any Gatorade or Pedialite, he did drink some water.

After this whole ordeal, Andrew concluded that now we are officially real parents after having taken a sick kid to the emergency room. Ugh - it's been a really long couple of days filled with heart break, helplessness and sleep deprivation. Even though I'm now sick myself, all I care about is that my baby seems to be on the mend. My heart broke a thousand times over the last few days, seeing my child suffer and knowing there was nothing I could do to take away his pain. It just really makes me that much more thankful that he was born healthy and hasn't had any health issues. It's been a rough couple days.