Conner's Trip to the ER

I thought Conner's first trip the the ER would be because he broke something or needed stitches...nope!
Friday night he was not feeling up to par, I was at the Indigo Girls with a friend of Joe's from work, Joe was at her house hanging with the husband and all the kids. Conner didn't feel like eating pizza, didn't want to run around and go on the swings. He fell asleep at 8:15. He had been up late the night before because we were at a cookout with my family and we slept at grammy's and he was up early. But he kept waking up and saying his tummy hurt. Joe told him he could sleep with us, thinking this would make him feel better.

We get home at midnight and bring him to bed. He is still saying his tummy hurts but he falls asleep. He wakes up once or twice saying his tummy hurts still and at 5am he was burning up, temp 101.8 and his tummy still hurts and he can't sleep. We decided to take him to the ER. Lucky for us nobody was in the waiting room.

They get him in and take his temp, 101.3 for them. They said they would like to get some blood work and x-ray of the belly, that is standard whenever a kid comes in with a fever and belly pain.
Taking blood was horrible, noone likes to see their baby get stuck with needles! They are telling him he can't move, he is THREE! Of course he is going to flinch and move when they stick him with a needle. They couldn't get it in the first arm so they tried the other arm and it worked and he calmed down and watched them collect 3 tubes of blood. He got to pee in a cup and get x-rays. We had to do some explaining that it wasn't going to hurt and how neat it was too. They took one of him laying down and then one standing up. After that was over he finally fell asleep, poor little guy.

I called my parents and they came right up. It was good to have them there, for me and Joe and for Conner. The doctor said that Conner's white blood count was elevated and they saw a little pool of fluid in his belly. This could mean he has a virus. After Conner had been sleeping for a little bit the new nurse comes in nice and loud and says they want to do a cat scan and we have to have him drink this drink. So, we had to wake him up- nobody likes to be woken up, and tell him to drink this nice drink- I really think it was raspberry crystal light- it looked and smelled just like it! I asked if he had to drink all of it, and they said they would actually like him to drink 2 glasses of it! That didn't happen, we got him to finally drink about an inch of drink- that was a lot! Joe bribed him with Chuck E Cheese's, said he could go if he drank, the more he drank the more rides he could go on at CEC. We keep getting him to take little sips.

My parents arrived right as Conner was going in for his scan. He didn't want it of course and when he saw the huge machine he started crying. The guy was really good about it, he said he was going to be there all day and if Conner needed to go back to his room and calm down, it was fine, just bring him back when he was ready. We kept talking to him, telling him how daddy goes on this machine a lot, and it's just like a ride and the tech was showing him how it moves back and forth and up and down and lights go on. We told him it was just like a spaceship. We had to take his shirt and shorts off but we got him to lay down on the machine and he did really good.Joe and I put on the xray aprons and we stayed with him the whole time. The guy talked on the speaker and did a blastoff countdown for Conner. It was good, he had fun and as soon as he got off he said " I go to Chuck E Cheese now!" We got him dressed and walked back to the room and he got to see Mimi and BB and that made him all excited. He was starting to pep up, maybe the tylenol was working. After a while of convincing him he couldn't go home and CEC was still closed, he layed down on me on the bed. Now we are waiting for the results.

The new doctor (shift change) came in, she was nice. She was explaining everything and all the scenarios. She called the surgeon to come in and look at everything. Everyone has been looking at his cat scan but since he is so tiny, has no fat, the machine is bigger and he didn't drink enough of he contrast drink, it was hard to get a good look. They were looking at what they thought was his appendix and enlarged the pictures but then they look all grainey. They had about 3 different docs/techs and the surgeon look at them. The doc said that they may want to take Conner to Worcester to see the pediatric surgeon. What they want to rule out is an appendicitis, thats what they usually think when there is a fever, belly pain and high white blood count. But she said other than the white blood count, fever and small amount of fluid, Conner was perfectly healthy. His urine sample was fine and all his other organs and tests were fine, so THAT WAS A RELIEF. Because of course we are thinking- appendicitis, or cancer or who knows what!

The surgeon comes in and is talking to us and he is very good... except for the fact that he said we don't really know what is wrong with Conner. He made Conner jump up and down and he said if it was his appendix he would not be able to jump up and down, and after all the people looking at his scan, they can pretty much rule that out. He said there were a couple scenarios and if some of the results were different we would be talking surgery, and we are not. He said it could be the start of a virus because they counts weren't high enough to suggest the virus was there for a while, it was just starting.. ?? I don't know , he was saying a lot! But for the most part, he said, we did the right thing bringing him in and we could take him home. He said to come back if our instincts tell us too. If his fever doesn't go away, he is puking, getting worse... bring him back. The doc also said to give his doctor a call to let her know everything that went on. They said if he didn't get better we would bring him back and repeat his bloodwork and see what his white count did- if it went up. That's the only way to really tell.

We got him home- he wa very excited to leave. They said to give him lots of juice, liquids and if he feels like eating- carbs, and to take it easy. We got him to take some chewable tylenol and rest. He wouldn't let my parents leave. Joe went up to take a nap- because we didn't get much sleep and Conner and I rested downstairs with my parents. After a while he did let my parents leave and he fell asleep for about an hour, maybe an hour and a half, so I got an hour nap! He is feeling better, still has a small fever. Of course, what is he asking about the whole day... Chuck E Cheese, he is wondering when it is opening and when he is going. Once his fever went down and he was starting to perk up,... we brought him! We were giving him whatever he wanted that day- he was brave and went through a LOT, poor kid. Joe gave him some ground rules about taking it easy and not running. He doesn't go in the tunnel, climbing thing with the slide so thats good. He played a bunch of video games and went on a couple rides. After that we took him to McDonald's because he said he was hungry- he ate a couple fries, that's it though. He was feeling much better. We let him sleep with us again and he wanted to go to bed early so I put Caillou on and we both fell asleep.

No more fever, he is eating up a storm and bossing us around. He has played his Lightening McQueen video game a ton, went outside, watched tv... he is back to normal now.

That was pretty scary, but I bet if we didn't take him to the doctors it probably would've been just like a regular little quick bug with a fever, we just know more because they did bloodowork and all that jazz. So who knows, whenever you don't feel good and have a virus or fever, maybe that's what happens to your bloodcount and maybe that's what happens in your belly... nurses/docs out there... help me out!

All I know is my baby is ok and I am glad. I felt bad for him having to go through all that, and I didn't enjoy the worrying either. He is a tough kid, what a trooper!