It all started out on New Year's Eve. Boston had been having a cough and some congestion, and around 10 PM decided to throw up. Of all people throwing up on New Year's I was not expecting it to be Boston. He was so irritable and would fall asleep for about twenty minutes and then wake up crying. He threw up about 3 or 4 times that night. It just breaks my heart seeing him throw up. His little body is confused what is going on and he looks so helpless. He had a fever for a few hours and then it would break with the fever reducer or with a cold towel on his head. This pattern happened over the next 3 days, but not so severe with the throwing up. He did not want to eat anything and would barely drink water(his favorite) or milk. I was hesitant to take him to the doctor with no fever, I felt they would just say there is nothing they can do and send us home. By Wednesday, mid-day, my mom said he was so lethargic, could barely hold his head up, and hadn't really drank anything all day. He had very minimal wet diapers too. So I finally decided it was time to head over to his pediatricians office.
When we arrived at the doc's office, on January 4th 2011, they checked his ears, oxygen levels, weight, and temperature. To our surprise, they found he had his first ear infection, his weight had dropped back down to 19 pounds (we have worked so hard to increase this), his oxygen levels were super low (83,84) and he had temperature of 101. They had 3 different doctors come in and listen to his lungs and they came to the conclusion that they would like to give him a breathing treatment to see if they could get his oxygen levels up and see if they could break up some of the mucus in his lungs.
That was probably the one of the most traumatizing experience I have entailed so far in mommy hood besides the next event that took place. I had to hold him down trying to keep a mask over his nose and mouth to try to get the albuterol into his body. He was NOT having anything to do with that. They even had a cute Dino mask, but he did not care.
After they tried the breathing treatment they tested his oxygen again, and it had not improved. They relayed the message to us that with his oxygen being low while he was alert and awake, is an indicator it probably dropped super low while he was sleeping and can be very dangerous. The doctors all believed he probably had Pneumonia as well. They tried giving him Oxygen in the office to see if they could bring it up and you would have thought they cut off one of Boston's arms. He was screaming blood murder, ripping off sticky band aids and throwing down the oxygen mask, and nose cannula. After this experience, they sent us up to Riverton Hospital to be admitted. That was a hard thing to deal with. I was NOT expecting that at all from this doctor's visit. Especially, since I was preparing myself for the following week for his clogged tear duct eye surgery he was suppose to have and be put under general anesthesia.
When we arrived at Riverton Hospital, they were all prepared for our arrival. The nurses put an IV in him (I left the room for this one) and again tried to give him oxygen. We again had to hold his arms down and just wait until he calmed down so he wouldn't rip the nose cannula out. He was so exhausted and tired by this point he just let it stay in. The doctor came and checked him out and ordered a chest x-ray to be completed to confirm/deny Pneumonia. The results came back negative. The doctor came to the conclusion that he probably had some viral infection defined as bronchulitis with children under 2. This can be caused from a number of things, typically RSV. Unfortunately, there is no treatment due to it being viral. They did give him some antibiotics through his IV for his ear infection as well as some fluids to get him hydrated again.
We ended up staying for a full 24 hours. The nurses and doctors were great with him, but it was a long stay. By 11 AM the next day Boston was feeling back to his normal self, wanting run around, which was impossible with cords hooked up to him and the wall. It was pretty difficult to keep him in a hospital bed for the next 7 hours. We were released around 6 PM with oxygen orders at night. We had to have a home health care company come out and bring us oxygen and concentrator. This again was a challenging actually keeping it on his little face.
While we were in the hospital we had a dietitian come and meet with us and give us some awesome tips on how we could try to get some weight on his body. He is still about 20 pounds and should be upwards of 24 plus. He is doing sooooooo much better with eating as well as feeling 100% like our cute little dude. It was definitely not the most pleasant experience, but I am grateful we had a great support system and a great team of physicians and nurses helping us out.
We now will have to go back to the hospital for an outpatient surgery on February 29th for his clogged tear duct procedure. The anesthesiologist does not like to put kids under within 6 weeks of an illness. A blog update will be sure to follow on this. We love our little man, and are glad he is a relatively healthy little boy.
