The Week From Hell!!!

It all started Monday night when my 12 year old daughter came home from a 3 week visit at her father’s house. She called me from Atlanta crying…she had a headache, her throat hurt and she was cold and shaking. I wanted to hurt someone!!! My kid calls me sick and there’s nothing I can do about it because she’s hours away from me. I was NOT happy.

Any the way, she gets off the plane and I could tell right away that she had a fever. She was really pale and her checks were red. I also looked down her throat and one of her tonsils was covered in white. Mom diagnosed her with strep throat. We got back to the hotel and she had a fever of 102.4. When I gave her Tylenol, she didn’t even make it back to the couch before she threw up. Lovely!

Now it’s Tuesday and I’ve taken her to an urgent care clinic. Doc says strep throat and gives her a shot of penicillin in the arse. She was not happy. lol Even today, Sunday, she still has a bruise at the injection shit. So we go back to hotel and all is well.

Until Wednesday that is. It’s about 4:00 AM and she starts throwing up. I called the clinic and asked if there was anything over-the-counter that I could give her. Nurse said no and that I needed to bring her back in. Back to the clinic we go. This time they draw blood and diagnosis her with an ear infection and say her WBC is leveled. They give her Zithromax and Phenergen for the nausea, and send us on our way. Wednesday night wasn’t that bad, only she started complaining that her stomach hurt.

So Thursday morning I called the clinic…AGAIN! Nurse says doc wants an ultrasound and an x-ray. We head to St. John’s hospital and the diarrhea kicks in. It’s almost like it’s involuntary. She stands up, she goes. She sits down, she goes. This is not good. Both the ultrasound and the x-ray came back with ‘insignificant findings’…meaning all is well, but I had to go back to the hotel to find that out because no one at the hospital would tell me. I talked to the doc and he said that since stomach pain wasn’t the reason I took her to the clinic yesterday, he wanted to see her again. Ok fine. Back to the clinic we go. Doc examines her stomach and he looks me right in the eye and says, “I don’t like this. Go to the emergency room.” So I’m thinking I have enough time to track down Tony and drop the other 3 kids off. Did I mention that they were also with me this whole day?!?!? Anyway, doc says he’s calling the emergency room and letting the doc there know what’s going on. I said, “I have to go now?” He said, “Right now.” Lovely!

We get to the ER…Did I mention that at this point she’s in so much pain that we’re going by wheelchair everywhere? Not fun…So the ER doc wants to do a CAT scan. I know that this means an IV and such. My poor baby! She’s been such a trooper for days. Didn’t cry over the penicillin shot, didn’t cry over having her blood drawn, and now she has to have her blood drawn again , get an IV and get a CAT scan. To make it worse, she had to drink two HUGE cups of Berium for the scan, but again, like a trooper, not a peep out of her. She actually had to have her blood drawn twice. The first time was just a blood draw. The second time had to be done a specific way because they were checking for bacteria in her blood. During the scan the tech told me that her appendix looked inflamed to him, but that he wasn’t a doctor that was just his opinion. He also said her bowel looked enlarged.

Here comes the doc. He said and I quote, “We’re seeing things here that we shouldn’t be seeing in a 12 year old.” Ok, now I’m freaking out. He said her appendix was inflamed; there was an abscess close to her appendix that may or may not be the cause for her appendix being inflamed. He also said she had fluid in the stomach which led him to believe that the abscess was leaking and that she had an intestinal/bowel blockage. He was calling in for a surgical consult. Have I mentioned lately that I’m SO NOT happy?!?!?

Surgeon comes and he’s just as concerned. Says she’ll have an emergency appendectomy as soon as his team arrives. It’s about 11 PM now and everyone had to be called in. At this point I lost it. (Thank you JoAnn and Summer for the last night calls and talking with me throughout this whole process!) Her WBC count was 16,000+, the normal is 10,000. Her WBC bands were 23%, the normal is 7%. He said that she was a very sick little girl and we’d know just how sick once he got in there. I was calm again by the time we took her up to surgery. He said a normal appendectomy could take anywhere from 15 minutes to 1 hour. The waiting began.

About 2 ½ hours later and me freaking out! The doc comes out and says that her appendix had ruptured and that from her chest to her pelvis had been full of puss (probably was the abscess they saw). He said she was sicker than they first thought and that she’d likely be in the hospital for 5 to 6 days on IV antibiotics. We could only hope now that she didn’t develop another abscess and that’d have to go back in and drain it.

Then I proceeded to get into a fight with the nurse. She told us that one of us had to be in the room with her at all times. We tried to explain for the millionth time to these people that WE DON’T LIVE HERE!!! We have 3 other kids and are currently staying in a hotel. This was not her problem. Then she had the audacity to try and guilt me. My child just had surgery; didn’t I want to be there for her? Didn’t I want her to wake up and see me? OH HELL NO!!! I seem to recall being at that same hospital not 5 hours before her surgery and they told me I could go home. After I told her that she needed to get off her lazy ass and take responsibility for her patients, she went and got the head nurse. Of course I want to be there for my daughter. Of course I don’t want her to wake up and be scared after coming out of surgery, but I also have 3 other kids and NO HOME!!! So I said to the head nurse, for every policy there is an exception to policy and that there had to be some sort of middle ground. She said she’d have someone come up from social services in the morning. I’ve had a REALLY long day and it’s 3 in the morning! Obviously I was not at my best. They weren’t kidding about someone having to be IN THE ROOM at all times. I couldn’t go get something to eat unless Tony was there so forget about a smoke break. An absolute nightmare!!!

By Friday morning, she was doing a lot better than they had thought she would. She was already sitting up and drinking. The nurse said we had to get her walking so she would recover faster. I understand the medical reasoning for this, but it still baffles the mind that less than 12 hours after an operation you’d want someone up and walking! The surgeon came and said that if she kept doing that well she might be able to get out of the hospital Saturday. The weekend on-call doctor had other plans. He wanted her to have another round of antibiotics, so no going home Saturday. I wanted to cry.

Now it’s Sunday. The doctor comes in and says, “I’m going to let you go today.” I said, “Can I hug you?” lol She’s feeling a lot better but still on the mend. She’s still in pain and moving at a snails pace. Once she left the recovery room, they never gave her any pain medication. Not even Tylenol…bastards!!! She’s not at all happy about the frequent walks she has to take and gets pissy if we try to make her eat, lol, but at least she’s home and on her was to being healthy again.

This has been a week from hell! I’ve never been so scared and worried in my life. Even in the 21st century, people still die from a ruptured appendix. I’ve already told her that she’s grounded for life for scaring the hell out of me. lol

Next up…the actual move to Houston. God help me!!!