A Hospital Christmas

First of all, I'm going to tell the story how it is. I'm not really going to dwell on the positive or negative, rather...just the way it was. We were very, very blessed by so many people during this time and we are so grateful! Thank you so much for all the prayers for Claire and for the little acts of kindness. We feel very undeserving of it all, but we are so thankful to have such wonderful people in our lives.

The week before Christmas was going wonderfully. Wednesday was my piano recital, which went wonderfully, and then I was off! I'm almost convinced that a break from "work" is arguably the best feeling in the entire world.  I had great plans for the Christmas season since Christmas was only 5 days away.


Thursday, however, didn't bring candy canes and cookies. It brought fevers. Pesky, stupid little fevers for both kids. They weren't the scary kind, they were low. We've had to deal with a couple of seizure-less fevers since April, so I went about it very calmly. I gave my children our beloved medication (which I'm thinking is going to become our 3rd child), gave them dinner and stuck them in the bathtub.

Claire seized.

Emergency room.

Home.

Saturday, the fevers were thankfully gone, but the worst diarrhea imaginable began for that poor little girl. She had no control over it. Sorry for the illustration, but it was complete liquid. So much so that it would pour out of her diaper onto the floor. She hated it. So did I. It was gross.

We tried to keep her fluids up, but she wouldn't drink or eat anything. I'm sure she felt horrible and a drink was the last thing on her mind. By Sunday night her bowel movements looked like water with a slight yellow tint to it. I called the nurse and she told us to go straight to the hospital to get an IV. It was a busy night for the ER, so they started her IV in a triage room since all of their actual rooms were full. Brian and I both thought that they'd (1) leave us in there,  (2) give her one bag of fluid, and (3) send us home. The doctor wasn't very concerned since she was still able to cry, so she couldn't be too dehydrated, right? Well, they did some blood work and left us alone for about an hour. At that point they came back and moved us to an actual room. Wrong on #1. The doctor came in and said his "visual exam" of her being ok was wrong. Her blood work showed that she was pretty dehydrated. He said that if 16-20 were being moderately dehydrated, she was a 14. Not the worst, but pretty bad. They were going to give a second bag of fluids. Wrong on #2.

After she was done with the second bag, we were preparing to go home. The nurse came in and told us they were considering admittance because her heart rate wasn't dropping like they wanted it to. She was supposed to be between 80 - 110 pbm and she was sitting between 118-140. They never came back to inform us of their decision, instead they just kinda came in and took us. Wrong on #3. By this time it was about 1:00 am on Christmas Eve. We were really hoping for good news that we could be home that night and in time for Christmas. Claire's pediatrician came in (bless his ever loving heart) and told us not to get our hopes up. Hopefully we could have her home by Christmas afternoon, so don't get too excited.

Well, I went home with Jared. Now, I know some of you may be thinking, "What!? The mother went home????" Well, I feed Jared and Jared must sleep in his bed if you ask him. So, there you have it. I had to be with him. This hospital stay wasn't nearly as scary because we knew what was causing her illness. I wasn't scared of her having repeat seizures because she didn't have a fever. We weren't dosing her every three hours to keep that lurking episode away. It was an easier stay.


She refused to have anything to eat or drink and it was frustrating. We were hoping she'd have a bowel movement so they could get a stool culture, but she didn't have one (which was actually a good sign that she was at least getting slightly better). At the beginning of the day she was very docile, cuddly, sad, and sleepy. She told Brian, "Daddy, get in your bed!" and pointed to it so she could watch a movie and go to sleep.

By the end of the day she was getting sassy again. I went home to get some dinner and to have Jared sleep a little bit. A crawling baby on the hospital floor really grossed me out, so he spent most of the time away from the hospital and I think he really missed Claire by the end of it. He would get so excited to see her. As I was going back to the hospital that night, we got a call from "Santa" saying that we had a gift on the porch. I was in a rush, so I grabbed it in a hurry and got in the car and opened it. Before I even saw what it was, the note, "Merry Christmas, we hope this helps with the rough year you've had" made me bawl all the way to the hospital. Pretty sure it was the ward, and we are so grateful. All-in-all, this Christmas was getting pretty....down in the dumps, but we were so overwhelmed by how giving people are and it made our Christmas sweeter.


Brian's parents flew in that night, so we tried to have their "Santa brings gag gifts" tradition in the hospital, but Claire was so ornery that we had to stop before we began. Brian was pretty bummed. The hospital had a Santa come around and bring gifts, but she was asleep and didn't get to see him. After I dropped the in-laws off, I had this genius idea of taking a fail proof food to the hospital. I have never seen Claire refuse an olive, so I took her a whole can....ahem....minus the few I just had to test. :) Well, she ate almost the entire thing. WONDERFUL! Thank you, can of olives!

I stayed until midnight on Christmas Eve and had her open the coloring packet I made her. She loved it  and it made me so happy. We colored until the resident doctor came in. He said that we would be good to go tomorrow morning (Christmas) and he would write up her discharge papers. YAY!

Christmas morning I was a little slow going and didn't get to the hospital until 10:30. She was all dressed and ready to go. Apparently, after her IV was out and she was free to get out of bed, she stood up and said, "Oh my goodness, what the heck!" and wouldn't go near the bed again. She was still pretty clingy, but in better spirits.

My parents came down to exchange gifts. Claire didn't act as excited as I was hoping, but she was still pretty weak, so I couldn't be too disappointed. It was fun nonetheless and the kids got spoiled! It was fun to see my family and spend a little bit of Christmas with them. 

Thank you Mom, Dad, Jason and Trevor!

We decided to do Christmas on the 26th so we could still have Santa come to our house, which was a good decision given all that was happening. Actually before my parents came, my friend/neighbor, who is out of town, had a pipe burst and had their basement flood. It was so terrible. What a Christmas. So, we spent the next couple hours salvaging anything wet trying to minimize damage. What a horrible mess. I felt so terrible. 

Well, we had our normal Christmas Eve and Santa came. Christmas morning came, we ate breakfast, we sat around, we waited. Claire would not wake up! Brian's dad had to leave at 10:00, so we decided to start Christmas without Claire and have her join in when she woke up.

We actually finished exchanging gifts and she was still asleep! Yeah....not the super exciting "MOM! There are so many presents!" reaction I was hoping for. FINALLY, we got around to opening the kids' gifts. They had a blast and it took us FOREVER since (A) they got spoiled with tons of stuff and (B) they had to play with it all in between gifts.

It seemed like we opened presents all day since we also had to wait for Grandpa to get back so they could open Grandparent gifts. It was probably better that way so they could play in between. So Merry, very weird, Christmas. It really was a good day and we're so glad she was able to come home for it.

What brings in the New Year like CROUP???? Seriously? I know. It's the same scenario as last April. Hospital, then croup. At least I know that pink eye could be coming up next Friday. I hope that one disappoints me and doesn't show up. Now we're all sick and waiting to see the outside world again. We're hoping that next Christmas is a little more eventful...or should I say less eventful? :) It didn't really feel like the holidays at all with all of this sickness going around.

We hope your Christmas was wonderful!