Monday night we continued our tour of Kaiser hospitals with a stop at Irvine. Here's how it went down:
For the last several nights Ben has woken up screaming, oh...every 30 minutes or so. Then around his 3:30/4:30 wake-up he wouldn't go back to sleep. No apparent signs of illness, no fever...just no sleeping, constant crying. Bad napping during the day, crabby in the evening...loads of fun. On Sunday he developed a runny nose. Not surprising considering I've had a heinous cold that has been pummeling me for the last week. But he still didn't have a fever, and he was (besides the lack of sleep) still acting completely himself, so I wasn't too worried. Yesterday (Monday) when I left for work he still had that runny nose, and he hadn't slept much at all. I was a little nervous about going to work, but he was with my mom, so since I only have a couple of sick days left I figured it was best to save the sick days and let my perfectly capable mom take care of him.
As of 9:00ish he had a temperature of 100.3.
About an hour later it was 102.7. After Tylenol.
So I spent half of third period on the phone with Kaiser getting transferred from one employee to another just to find out if I should take him in or just wait it out. Person #5 told me to take him in, and transferred me to appointment services. The second appointment services person I talked to told me the only available appointment was in after-hours care at 6:00, so I made it and turned back to my neglected pre-teens.
As I talked to my mom throughout the day he was clearly getting worse. Not eating, not drinking, fever not abating, even with Tylenol. Not sleeping, lethargic...the works. When I got home at 3:30 his temp was 105.6 and he was panting. Since the nurse on the phone told me to call back if his symptoms worsened and/or his fever spiked, I did what I was told. Four people later, I was told to not wait for my 6:00 appointment and go to the ER. I hung up the phone, cried for 30 seconds, called Matt, and headed out the door. That was around 4:00.
We were in the waiting room until 6:00.
The doctor came in at 6:45.
Before that, though, we spent some quality time in the waiting room. Thankfully we only had to wait in the main waiting room for maybe 10 minutes. We were triaged pretty quickly, at which point his fever had gone down to 102.8 (thanks AC in the car). She gave him some Tylenol and sent us into a small waiting room behind triage where we were alone for a while. After a bit a sweet woman in her nineties and her daughters came in. They sang to Ben and tried (to no avail, sadly) to make Ben smile. Eventually we were taken to a small, private room in the ER. Where we waited some more.
For the last several nights Ben has woken up screaming, oh...every 30 minutes or so. Then around his 3:30/4:30 wake-up he wouldn't go back to sleep. No apparent signs of illness, no fever...just no sleeping, constant crying. Bad napping during the day, crabby in the evening...loads of fun. On Sunday he developed a runny nose. Not surprising considering I've had a heinous cold that has been pummeling me for the last week. But he still didn't have a fever, and he was (besides the lack of sleep) still acting completely himself, so I wasn't too worried. Yesterday (Monday) when I left for work he still had that runny nose, and he hadn't slept much at all. I was a little nervous about going to work, but he was with my mom, so since I only have a couple of sick days left I figured it was best to save the sick days and let my perfectly capable mom take care of him.
As of 9:00ish he had a temperature of 100.3.
About an hour later it was 102.7. After Tylenol.
So I spent half of third period on the phone with Kaiser getting transferred from one employee to another just to find out if I should take him in or just wait it out. Person #5 told me to take him in, and transferred me to appointment services. The second appointment services person I talked to told me the only available appointment was in after-hours care at 6:00, so I made it and turned back to my neglected pre-teens.
As I talked to my mom throughout the day he was clearly getting worse. Not eating, not drinking, fever not abating, even with Tylenol. Not sleeping, lethargic...the works. When I got home at 3:30 his temp was 105.6 and he was panting. Since the nurse on the phone told me to call back if his symptoms worsened and/or his fever spiked, I did what I was told. Four people later, I was told to not wait for my 6:00 appointment and go to the ER. I hung up the phone, cried for 30 seconds, called Matt, and headed out the door. That was around 4:00.
We were in the waiting room until 6:00.
The doctor came in at 6:45.
Before that, though, we spent some quality time in the waiting room. Thankfully we only had to wait in the main waiting room for maybe 10 minutes. We were triaged pretty quickly, at which point his fever had gone down to 102.8 (thanks AC in the car). She gave him some Tylenol and sent us into a small waiting room behind triage where we were alone for a while. After a bit a sweet woman in her nineties and her daughters came in. They sang to Ben and tried (to no avail, sadly) to make Ben smile. Eventually we were taken to a small, private room in the ER. Where we waited some more.
We were there until about 11:30.
It was a long, long night. Poor Ben got a thermometer up his butt at least a half a dozen times. He was given a couple of doses of Tylenol and a dose of Ibuprofen, and we had to strip him down and put ice packs on him to get the fever down. We occupied our time by reading, feeding Elmo applesauce, playing peek-a-boo behind the curtain, taking walks, and decorating my shirt and Ben's leg with the stickers he got from having a catheter. The highlight, though, was some guy down the hall who, for at least an hour, was screaming "F*&^ NO!!!" over and over again while Ben laughed hysterically.
Although the doctor's early assessment was that it was just a particularly vicious flu virus, he wouldn't let us go until Ben's fever had broken and he was sure there were no hidden infections. So poor Ben got a chest x-ray and a urine catheter. At 11:00 his temp was 99.5, and all his tests had come back clear. So we were sent home.
Basically that 6:00 appointment would most likely have been much cheaper, shorter, and less invasive. Oh well. Kaiser.
Ben got to bed around 11:45pm. He woke up around 12:45, but went back to sleep fairly easily. He's been sleeping soundly ever since. I suppose that's the upside to this adventure. Of course, that means I got about four hours of sleep. Oh well. Still beats every other night this week.
In just a few weeks I've held my little boy while he got blood work, three sets of chest x-rays, an IV, and a foot-long tube up his wee. Lucky us.
Sigh. At least it's nothing serious. We're thankful we have health insurance and a home to return to. Matt is staying home with Ben today, and we're praying for a swift recovery (and, if I can be so bold, perhaps more than a week of health before the next round?).
1 comment:
This broke my heart! Your poor little guy ;-( I'm glad the eff word amuses him so much. I'm sad he got poked and prodded so much. I have NEVER seen you with your hair down (except in the picture you posted!), pretty. Hope you are doing well other than the most recent events.
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