Things have gone from bad to worse, and I’m absolutely exhausted.
Yesterday was a day that must’ve come straight from the brains of hell, delivered just for me.
On Monday night (but really Tuesday morning), Phoenix, my 6 year old, who has been struggling with an ongoing GI issue, decided to throw up a ton of blood at 1am. Ummm….what??!
Okay. Fine. So, that’s happening. My husband and I debated on whether or not we should bring him to the ER immediately, or first thing in the morning, and we ultimately decided to allow him to sleep, monitor him closely, and bring him in the morning.
At 8:15am on Tuesday, my oldest son Christian had his cast on from when he broke his arm on Friday. That went great, he did fine, and he loves the pink he chose. He’s also pretty proud of all the signatures he has on it now.
While I was at his appointment, I got a call from my husband that he needs to take our son to the ER.
Well, I was on edge all morning being out with Christian, and trying to move quickly so that I could get back to take Phoenix to the ER (we only have one car, so we’re doing the best we can juggling everything around).
I fully thought he meant he needed to take Phoenix to the ER, thinking maybe he threw up blood again, but…NOPE.
He did not mean Phoenix. He meant Atlas, our 2 and a half year old.
Apparently Atlas got into his mischief, and got himself hurt. He was bleeding a lot and needed stitches.
So my dad drove my husband and Atlas to the hospital.
Luckily, the ortho building I was already in with Christian shared a parking lot with an ER. So I told them to come to this one, the one I was already at.
When they got there, I told my dad to come into the ortho building where I was with Christian so he could take over (we were done, just checking out and making a new appointment) so I could rush across the parking lot to the ER.
My dad drove Christian to school, and I ran in to the ER just as Atlas was being brought back to be seen.
Ugh. My heart broke. My poor baby. I hated seeing him like that, it was so hard.
All this time, I was still so worried about Phoenix, who I knew still needed to be seen. I’d been messaging with his doctor back and forth trying to get a direct admission to the hospital rather than going through the ER, but because he was actively having bloody vomit, they needed him to go through the ER to make sure he was stable enough to be admitted.
We finally made it home with Atlas by noon ish, I packed a bag for me and Phoenix and we headed to the hospital.
We got there just after 1pm. And it wasn’t an easy journey. They put in an IV, did labs, a cat scan, gave him some meds, and a few other things. They wanted us to transfer to Dallas, over 2 hours away…and I said absolutely hell no.
Last time we transferred to Dallas it was an absolute nightmare, and it wasn’t worth it at all.
After a lot of back and forth with the ER doctor, the doctor on the pediatric floor, and our pediatrician, they finally made it work so we could be admitted at our hospital. The issue was that it was now 5pm at that point, and they couldn’t get ahold of our local pediatric GI doctor. And they wanted the approval of a GI doctor to admit him under her care.
Anyway, we got it to work out, thankfully. There’s no way I could be 2 hours away from home with 1 car, and all 3 of my kids needing me.
Now, I didn’t get ANY sleep Monday night. After he threw up blood, all I could do was watch him and make sure he was okay while my mind raced all night long. I literally maybe got 2 hours of sleep all night.
I’ve been at a hospital for about 13 hours at this point. I haven’t eaten all day, and I was hurting. He still wasn’t moved into a room yet, it was 8pm, and I desperately needed to go home.
My husband was with me at that point, after getting our other 2 kids put to bed, so he stayed with Phoenix while I went home.
I got home by 8:30pm, fed the goats, took a shower, ate a proper meal, and went to sleep. I slept so freaking good. It was the first night in nearly 2 weeks I wasn’t woken up by a kid in pain or sick or needing something. It was fantastic.
Of course, I woke up to Atlas being absolutely covered in puke, needing a bath with multiple shampoos, and burning everything in his bed…but I got us out the door and back the the hospital.
So, that’s where things are today. Phoenix is in the hospital, and I still have no answers. But he’s having some uncontrollable diarrhea, zero appetite, and is in rough shape. Good spirits, but rough shape.
I don’t know when we’re leaving, or what comes next, but we’re here. Exhausted, but hopefully on the right path.
Atlas looks like shit, he’s not handling his meds well, and I don’t know what to do about either of them. But we’re doing our best.
At least Christian is…just broken. Not quite so mysterious. I know how to handle a broken bone. I actually hate that I’m not at home right now helping him. The morning was nice because I got to see him and get him to school, but I won’t see him again until tomorrow morning.
It’s been a rough week. But we’ll get through it.
I’m about to go home again to sleep, thankfully Derek is here, and he’ll do the night shift.
Hopefully Atlas doesn’t get sick again, and things can begin to be less eventful.