Perspective

We had a very sick baby this week.

She's been a sick a lot in her first year of life, so when she had a temperature on Tuesday of 102, I didn't think much of it. She's had a temperature on and off for over a month now. Her pediatrician told me to start documenting it, and when I did--they stopped. So I chalked it up to teething. (I learned this from Marie--blame everything on teething!!!)

On Wednesday morning she woke up fine, but as the day progressed she felt warmer and looked worse so I gave her Motrin. As I was putting her down for nap I decided to check her temp and realized it was 103.6 WITH the Motrin in her system. It had been that high during the night a couple of times but then by morning it would be gone.

So to the ER we went.

Even though the waiting room was full, they checked us in right away. When the nurse took her temperature his face got very serious. I asked him how high it was and he would only say "very high". I asked if it was higher than 103.6 and he said yes.

The fact that he didn't want to freak me out by telling me, just freaked me out even more. I was even more freaked out when he made a phone call telling people to get ready for us ASAP and we were made first priority in the ER. I was so freaked out, I didn't even get to enjoy the fact that we were skipping out on a 3 hour wait for care.

Fortunately, Micah met up with us about that time.

They gave her another big dose of Motrin "to take the edge off"--by now she was just lethargic in my arms--and they started running tests. I saw another nurse take her temperature, and it was 104.6---and that wasn't even rectal.

They put in an IV line and did a complete blood work-up to rule out all kinds of things. Then they gave her a catheter to get a urine sample to rule out a urinary tract infection. She didn't have one (I told them that!) but she did have too much protein in her blood confirming that she was dehydrated (Duh! She's on fire people!)

I had to leave when they gave her the catheter, I couldn't watch, so Micah stayed. When I heard her screaming down two halls, I had to go back though--just in time for the IV line to go in. Poor baby. It was so traumatic for her, and there was nothing we could do. I still had the camera in her diaper bag from Easter, so I decided to document the trauma for her.

It took over 30 minutes to calm her down after that. She was NOT okay with what they had done to her.

A couple of pedialyte popsicles later, she had forgotten about the stuff in her hand and was reading books with us. After 3 or so hours all of the tests had come back fine and her temp was down to 99.8. So they made us an appointment for the next morning with her regular pediatrician and sent us home.

By the time she went to bed it was back up to 103.4 again...... It was a long night for me, alternating Motrin and Tylenol and checking her temperature every half hour.

We went to the doctor the next morning convinced that she had meningitis and was going to need a spinal tap or something equally horrible. Then her doctor said that her right ear was completely blocked and she couldn't see in it. So after they irrigated it, she was able to confirm that her "eardrum is full of white puss".

On one had we were incredibly relieved it was just an ear infection. On the other hand, why didn't the ER docs rule that out first??? They didn't even tell us they couldn't see in her ear. In their defense, I guess they were just so focused on getting her temperature down.

Two shots of antibiotics later---she is feeling much better. The next stop is ENT to discuss putting in tubes.

All this to say, it really put things in perspective when we thought something really COULD be seriously wrong. We are sooooo thankful that nothing is. I feel for all of those parents who watch their kids go through awful medical procedures and don't know if they will ever get better. I honestly can't imagine anything worse.