Why is my baby sick? Part 4

**Please be advised this post is graphic in some area**

Part 1 of this story can be found HERE

Part 2 of this story can be found HERE

Part 3 of this story can be found HERE

Tates slept in the hospital crib for about 3 hours before waking up and going back to sleep in the pull out chair with me. The chair itself wasn’t all that uncomfortable however Tates couldn’t seem to get comfortable and when he would fall asleep it was time to get his vitals so he would wake up. Even though the schedule was supposed to be every 4 hours whenever there was a shift change our nurse and the nurse that was taking over would come in to go over Tates condition and talk to us and meet him so he really didn’t get any sleep. There was also a flow of student doctors that would stop by and ask about his symptoms and check his lungs and heart.

7am came very fast and we are use to sleeping in until between 9am-10:30am so we got an early start on our first official day in the hospital. I ordered Tates some breakfast; scrambled eggs, a pancake and yogurt however he only ate a few bites of yogurt and then we could only interest him in a few more bites of graham crackers. He was drinking quite a bit though, and he isn’t a big drinker typically.

We were advised that the GI team would be doing ’rounds’ anywhere from 9am-10am so we patiently waited for them to arrive. It was a bit overwhelming when they all arrived, there was about 10 of them. Some students, some residents and then there was the staff Dr, they don’t get much higher than that. We went through the complete history of the last few weeks and a family history and Tates general history and then there was another exam.

With everyone around Tates crib and his lack of sleep and already being poked and prodded so much he was very nervous before the exam let alone during it. As a mother, whenever your child is hurt or fearful you just want to scoop them up and make it go away. Throughout this entire ordeal having to hold him down and let strangers upset him never got easier. One second you are the one holding them down to get stuck and the next you are trying to tell them it is over, for now at least. I think at least for us (and any parent of very small children) it is a little harder because Tates isn’t talking so he doesn’t understand as well as an older child that you can at least explain what to expect and what is going on.

For those of you thinking right now “Wait isn’t Tates 17 months old now? He should be talking!” I know, this is a whole separate concern of ours and we are addressing it with applying for help through our state agency for a speech therapist. We have an appointment on the 28th to see if he qualifies for therapy so please cross your fingers for us!

Talking with the staff Dr. after the exam he advises that we allow him to do a colonoscopy followed by an endoscopy if the colonoscopy found nothing alarming. At this point they have ran all non-invasive tests and have not been able to determine the problem, so this is the next step. They will have to put Tates to sleep with anesthesia, which was an immediate concern for us especially seeing as both sides of our family have trouble waking up from anesthesia as adults, but kids are always more of a worry. We wouldn’t be allowed in the Operating Room (OR) with him and we were concerned when they told us that we would have to hand him over to a nurse that would walk him back to the OR and lay him down on the gurney and then place the anesthesia mask over his face. We thought there is NO WAY Tates would do that without a screaming, kicking fight. They decided they would give him a calming medicine so he would be very relaxed before we had to hand him over and we agreed that was probably a good idea.

We were told Tates would have to drink almost 2 liters of cleansing out medicine so his colon would be clear for the scope and he also was put on a clear liquid diet until midnight when he would be hooked up to IV fluids until the procedure. I immediately pointed out that there was no way Tates would drink that much medicine in a few hours and DJ agreed. We were told if he didn’t complete the drinking he would have to have a feeding tube put in and the medicine would have to be taken that way. We decided to go ahead and skip even trying to have him drink and opted for the feeding tube. It was seriously hard to choose the feeding tube, and it wasn’t even very reassuring when the nurses told us that most of the time this has to be done anyway. Teenagers apparently have a hard time drinking that much of the medication and eventually get the tube.

With this cleansing medicine Tates would start to have even more diarrhea, only more extreme is what we were told. We were advised not to use our cloth diapers because we wouldn’t have enough according to the expected amount of everything inside Tates would be getting rid of along with the medication. The nurses weren’t sure if his stash would be ruined, so they provided us with a brand disposable to use and I set them aside to take home.

While waiting for the pharmacy to send up the medication for the feeding tube I ran home to run cloth diaper laundry and pack more things for another nights stay and get a bag ready for T-Bone for another night at my parents house. I felt like a bad mom leaving. I spoke to our nurse and she promised they would not do the tube without me being there. Tates and DJ were taking a nap so I flew like a mad crazy woman home and hurried to get things done and back to the hospital. It took me forever even though I was hurrying. I was about 20 minutes from arriving at the hospital when DJ called. They had woken from their nap and been told by the nurse that if I wasn’t back by 2pm (15 minutes from then) they would do it without me. The doctor wanted to get the medicine started so there would be plenty of time for it to work and get Tates cleaned out. I told DJ I would be there and to stall if I wasn’t! I drove like a crazy woman (at this point it is becoming common!) and ran with pillows and bags in hand to get to our room. I luckily ran into an abandoned hospital wagon (a trademark of the Children’s hospital) so I didn’t have to carry everything. I just made it! Tates caught one glimpse of that wagon and wanted a ride but there was no time for it now, I promised we would do it later.

As I was catching my breath, the nurse walked in to escort us to the procedure room where everything was on hand to insert the feeding tube. We opted to stay in the room and watch so we could immediately comfort Tates. The two nurses laid Tates down on the bed and rolled him up in a blanket making him a baby burrito and one nurse held his head still while the other tried to feed the tube up his nose and down his throat. GOD was there (I know he was the whole time) because she got it the first time. We could tell for sure it was in his stomach because a little bit of blue sports drink came up the tube. They then taped the tube to his face, but needed to redo it (as the first time it was on his lip a little) then around his ear and on to his back. Of course, Tates is screaming, kicking, crying and gagging like crazy this entire time and I am balling my eyes out which I expected but there was no way I wasn’t going to be there. As soon as I picked him up and settled him down and got back to the room he was hooked up to the cleansing medication. It was on a wheel cart kinda like an IV so we could be a little mobile, however Tates was like a zombie.

If you remember from above, Tates had just awakened from a nap, so he should have been slightly rested. However, he was seriously like a zombie. He just laid his head on my shoulder and stared at the wall next to the chair I was sitting in. He was drooling like crazy so we called the nurse thinking something was wrong and she told us it was because he was scared to swallow. He just laid there with his mouth open drooling miserably. The nurse assured us he wasn’t tasting the medicine, but you could tell he was just in shock almost, sitting catatonic. I got him re-situated and he drifted off to sleep again.

Staring at the wall

Nap right after nap time

When he woke up he was a bit startled by the nose tube, but thirsty, which was a good sign. Tates was restless in his room so we went walking in the halls for a bit. We passed the play room and Tates pointed to it, so we got some toys and brought them to his room. He really liked a few of the toys and seemed to be having fun with them, which was so nice to see him smiling and playing again.

Playing BEFORE the medicine kicked in

All of a sudden DJ said Tates had pooped. Usually, I am the one that knows when he poops (and I notice right away) so I asked DJ if he was sure, but before he could answer the smell hit me and I was at least 10 feet away from them both. I told DJ to grab him and I got a diaper and some wipes. We met at the crib to change him, however, this was no ordinary poop. The medicine had kicked in and Tates system was starting to clean out exploding. He had the biggest blowout in the history of mankind I think. He had completely soaked himself, DJ, the crib bedding, and there was a trail on the floor that had to be mopped up. Literally, this happened in less than 10 seconds. I am not even kidding when I say his insides were exploding out his tushy.

Immediately he had a rash all over his hiney (thanks to cloth diapering he hadn’t had a rash since we kicked disposables!). The nurse didn’t even really think the rash was that bad. She said she had seen kids with bloody bums before (I can’t even imagine that! Poor babies!) and gave us some goop that she said was awesome and should help. I didn’t really like it much because it didn’t wipe off very well. You had to almost scrub it off, which isn’t good considering his tush was irritated already. She advised us to just leave it on and wipe away the poop and the cream would coat his tush and protect it from the acidic explosions (Yikes right?).

So, we did end up needing the family laundry facility. As you can imagine, I wanted to wash the boys clothes ASAP since I wasn’t sure if colon contents stained.

The nurse rolled her eyes (at herself) and said she should have offered us some hospital clothes for Tates so we wouldn’t run out of or ruin his clothes. Tates was too small for the smallest scrubs (but I can improvise!) I rolled the pants waist down, the bottoms up, criss-crossed the back snaps on the shirt top and voila, the cutest little hospital patient you have ever seen!

Playing in our scrubs

The medication was making Tates very irritable and super cranky (as if he wasn’t entitled to be you know?), so the nurse offered some ibuprofen and I agreed. Unfortunately, there wasn’t an order in his chart, so she had to page the on call Dr. to get the OK, order it for his chart, and then call it in to the pharmacy to fill and send up. After thirty minutes of waiting, she called down to the pharmacy. They told her how super busy it was and Tates order was still quite a few from the top. However, after explaining the situation poor Tates was in, we had the ibuprofen 15 minutes later. Honestly, Tates was just getting too tired to fuss anymore, so I’m not sure if the ibuprofen even helped.

Poor guy is miserable

Over the next 9 hours Tates had horrible explosions of the tush and countless clothing changes. He was just miserable. Tates was supposed to be on the medication until he was pooping clear, however, when he had finished his IV bag he wasn’t clear, so the Dr. on call was paged and ordered more medicine. We, again waited for the pharmacy to send up the medicine, however, they were taking a really long time and there was almost no way we were going to be able to pump the amount of medication into Tates the Dr. had ordered before midnight. If the medication is pumped in too quickly it could make Tates vomit. Needless to say we didn’t make the midnight deadline, however, about half-hour after midnight Tates poop was clear! Little one was then hooked up to his IV and got comfy on Mommy in the flip chair and fell fast asleep (it was 1am now). Although we were advised that he would probably still be Mr. Exploding Tushy Pants even in his sleep, however, he didn’t poop overnight at all.

The lovely part of having an IV is that it and vitals need to be checked every hour. Yep, after the day Tates had, he was going to be woken up every hour.

We still didn’t have a set time for the procedure, which I say surgery, because he was knocked out and in an OR, but that is probably just the overprotective mom in me.

Sorry to keep dragging this out, but I really want to write it all and have it documented so Tates can read it one day….I am not trying to torture you loyal readers I promise!

More to be told………..

Comments

Angela Marie says:

July 24, 2011 at 5:34 pm

wow, I cant even imagine how you were feeling, let alone poor little Tates! you aren't boring me,t hats for sure, I keep checking Facebook to see if the new part of the story is up!

Minnesota Momma says:

July 24, 2011 at 7:43 pm

yikes poor kid i cant even imagine the tourment and how hard it is for you i brought my son to the ER once he was about 18 months at the time and the horrible nurse was trying for an iv she poked both arms twice his hands once each and his foot and still couldnt get one in! grandma was about to throttle her lol i had to hold her back. And of course after all the tourture no answers. Cant wait for next one!

Luna Wolfe says:

July 25, 2011 at 12:14 am

You keep me in suspense with this story! I am looking forward to reading more. I feel horrible for the little guy.

Gerri gerri_bolen@msn.com says:

July 25, 2011 at 1:20 am

oh my gosh poor baby I must say you stayed strong I would have been screaming at alot of nurses and doctors!!

Midnight Mommy says:

July 25, 2011 at 1:44 am

I am bawling…I am so sad for your little man. What hell have you guys been through, your entire family to see your little man sick and having to go through all of this. I just can't stop crying 'cause I know it can't be easy for you to write this either.

Eco Baby Mama Drama says:

July 25, 2011 at 2:40 pm

Thanks everyone for your supportive thought! This really has been so hard, T-Bone wasn't sick like this ever. And it is so hard to write all of this, I cry a lot (still) and DJ has to edit a lot~he says I write like I talk (duh! lol) and it takes him awhile to 'fix'. )