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Hospital Trip

This past weekend was not so great. We ended up at the childrens ER with Lil Man. Yes. It was one of the scariest experiences I can have as a Mother of a five month old. So, here’s what lead to our emergency visit (you may want to grab some tea/coffee and have a seat first).

  • Last Wednesday night (early Thursday morning), Lil Man started a low grade fever.
  • It started at 99.3 or so and went up to 100.5, so we called the pediatrician.
  • She okayed giving him meds and said to bring him in if the fever didn’t go down by Friday or Saturday.

It was a rough night. I didn’t get any sleep at all, but by Thursday evening, we discovered two little teeth coming out. He slept well that evening. The fever came down a bit Friday and broke Saturday. Again, he slept well Saturday night and Sunday proved to be a good day.

Sunday afternoon, I put him down for an afternoon nap. Right before he woke, E.T. left to pick up my nephew. While he was out, Lil Man woke from him nap extremely upset. He was crying loudly and non-stop. I went to pick him up, he was shaking head and toe. I was alarmed and thought he was having a seizure.

A couple months prior I had asked the pediatrician about seizures out of caution from reading about them so I was prepared to handle it. I called the doctor to let her know about the shaking, she said to take him to the hospital just in case.

I called E.T. to let him know we had to go to the hospital once he was back. He indicated he was on the way home about 2 minutes. I grabbed Lil Man’s bag as I always have that prepared. After both calls, he was still shaking head to toe.

What I wasn’t expecting? Lil Man turning blue. He had stopped crying and his lips was turning blue. I grabbed him and started preparing him to leave. Told my SIL we were heading to the hospital and asked her to confirm whether she thought Lil Man was slightly blue – I wanted to make sure I was not overacting. She said yes, E.T. came home and we off to the hospital.

This all happened within 10 minutes time – really.

From the time I went to see him until we headed to the hospital.

In the car, Lil Man seemed to be drifting. Having been previously CPR certified, I knew the signs. I thought he was passing out from not having oxygen. I gave him two short blows through the nose. His eyes opened and he woke both times.

Within five minutes we arrived at the ER. The waiting room was packed. I’d never seen so many children waiting at the ER before. By then, the shaking had stopped and his lips were spotted blue and clearing up. There was a little bit of foam bubbling on his lips which could have been from a seizure or could have been a result from him now breathing properly. You could still see spotted blue on his feet and hands.

I kept looking at him as we were waiting in line. And because he seemed to be past the extreme stage, was breathing and eyes open, I simply waited. The nurse noticed I was looking up and down at Lil Man and asked what was wrong while she was helping another. I explained the short issue to her.

Five minutes later we were in the backroom and they were looking at Lil Man. He now had a fever – 104 degrees. The nurse was surprised. We were very glad at that point to be in the hospital.

They gave him meds to bring down the fever and we went into a room. Changed Lil Man into a little gown. Here he is an hour after receiving meds:

Hospital Visit

After they took all his vitals the doctor told us everything was fine. She asked if we wanted to do more thorough testing. E.T. said yes. We wanted to be sure nothing was wrong, especially since we were headed onto a plane that day.

They took a blood sample and did other tests. For whatever reason, they also decided to do a urine test.

Do you know how they take a urine sample from an infant?

If you didn’t… I’ll tell you – through a catheter.

And no, they don’t put them out for it.

And even though it’s an itty bitty plastic tube, it’s still certainly painful.

There was nothing I could do except watch while he was screaming bloody murder.

About an hour later, the doctor came back and said he was positive for UTI. He had a urine infection. She was very surprised. Why?

  • Only 2% of boys get an urine infection
  • They don’t test boys after they are six months old – Lil Man was 5 days shy

They put in an IV to flush his system out first, then followed with meds to clear out the UTI. Here he is with the IV tub and a stint.. they put on the stint to keep him from moving his hands too much and to prevent him from pulling the IV out.

Hospital Visit Splint

The doctor said we were lucky. We had a strong and healthy little one. Most infants don’t fit off an infection for four/five days before serious symptoms display. And as far as the seizure – she said it couldn’t be ruled out, but also could not be confirmed since he wasn’t there when it occurred. Unfortunately, the chills have similar symptoms, so it’s hard to confirm 100% whether it was or wasn’t a seizure.

With antibiotics in hand and a doctors note to see our pediatrician the next day, we were released around 1am. Lil Man was feeling much better, no fever and back to his happy self.

We are thankful we “over reacted” and that we live so close to the hospital. In hindsight, we should have just called 9-1-1 to have the EMT arrive in case he needed the oxygen. The staff was amazing and we are thankful for that also.

——

We saw the pediatrician on Monday. She also could not rule out the seizure and told us to monitor him. As for the plane ride for our trip, she suggested a 1/4 tsp benadryl should we need it to calm him down for the ride.

And that is our hospital trip story.

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