Poor William. Spring break started out looking like it was going to be so much fun. William was going to stay with his Grandma and PawPaw Nau and get to go to golf camp. Katie was going to gymnastics camp. It all started Monday morning. As you may know, most golf courses are closed on Mondays. So William spent the day running errands with his grandparents. They were going to get a new car, so he played in the toy room of the car dealership. He got to go to his favorite restaurant, Pluckers, and had Jamaican Jerk wings. His quote, “these sure are some good jerks!” He proceeded to call me and tell me it was the best day of his life. Doesn’t take much, I guess.
Tuesday morning at 5:20am we got a call from Grandma. William had a high fever, but she was afraid to use the glass thermometer to find out exactly how high it was. He was miserable. He did throw-up once I think. He had the chills. Chris drove over to pick him up and bring him home. His fever was 104.6. This kid has never had a fever that high. He got some Tylenol and it came down though. He was generally fine that day at home with Chris. That afternoon, though, his fever spiked again. He went to Dr. Joe. They tested him for the flu… negative. Throat looked fine… not strep. He must have a virus. We were to treat the fever and keep him hydrated.
The next 4 days were alot of the same. He’d be fine from like 10am-3pm, then spike a fever again. He was listless, had very little appetite, threw up only a couple times, but started complaining about joint pain and headaches. He said it felt like his backbone wanted to come out. Twice during that week, Katie threw-up. So we figured they both had the same thing. She never spiked a fever though. And she bounced right back. William was literally on Tylenol every 4 hours and Motrin every 6 hours. He was maxed out on fever reduction medication. By Saturday morning we figured this wasn’t good. That’s just too much medicine so we headed back to our Doctor.
The Doc sent us for some bloodwork. William was such a trooper for the bloodwork. He was scared, but we distracted him with an iPhone game and giving Mommy instructions on how to play it. He requested a big Bakugan beforehand as a reward he would like, so after we were done we headed to the Toy Store. Next it was home for a nap. (Mommy was the only one who ended up taking one.) Dr. Joe called us and Chris came to wake me up. He said William’s bloodwork was of concern to him. His white blood count was 24.1. Too high. He wanted us to go to the Dell Children’s Hospital ER for a 2nd opinion. He was thinking it may be a bacterial infection or his appendix. We promptly called Grandma to pick-up Katie and we headed to the hospital.
They immediately put him in a wheel chair and tagged him for a penicillin allergy. We were triaged fairly quickly, but then sat in the waiting room for about an hour. William was pale and just sat there looking out the window, occasionally flipping through a book. Chris fell asleep while I tried to keep my mind off the idea of him having his appendix out by toodling with my iPhone. Unfortunately, I googled white blood count because I couldn’t recall if it was high or low and wanted to know to what extreme it was high or low. Boy did I regret that. The first thing that came up was leukemia. 4 of the 5 symptoms he had. I found myself praying that this was not what he had and we would still get to keep our little miracle.
It seemed to take forever once we got back to a room in the ER for a doctor to come see us. I think it was about 3 hours. But the nurses knew he would need an IV. This was a traumatic experience for William. He had never been in a hospital before. They numbed his arm with a cold spray. After the IV was in, they asked William if he wanted a sticker. He said “no,” but then replied “Sponge Bob” when they asked him who his favorite character was. They didn’t have a Sponge Bob sticker, so the nurse drew one and used it to cover up his IV so he wouldn’t have to look at it. I was very impressed by that. They put a little board under his elbow so he didn’t have to remember to keep his arm straight. Hindsight, I wish they had put it in his left hand instead of his right arm, but we survived.
Once the Doctor finally saw William, she did a very thorough exam. She, too, was concerned about his appendix and decided he needed an abdominal CT and chest x-ray. After she left the room and discussed it with the nurse, she came back and decided to do the chest x-ray first. William was scared for this procedure and decided to just close his eyes.
About 30 minutes after the test, the Doctor came in and said it was definitely pneumonia. He had a very large pneumonia in his right lung. She switched the CT to just a chest CT because she was concerned about a definitive line at the bottom of the x-ray that suggested there was fluid built up that may need to be drained. That would mean surgery. An hour later, we went into the “large donut” for the CT. We both got to stay with him for this. The funny thing is that he had been given morphine earlier in the night for the pain. He was kinda doped-up when they explained the CT and he looked at me and said “heh. I’m imagining a donut as big as me with pink icing. I want to lick it.”
Luckily the CT showed it was only pneumonia and there was no fluid. Whew! We were going to be admitted to the hospital and have to stay for a few days. As we waited for a room, they put a blood oxygen monitor on William’s thumb. I told him it made his thumb look like Rudolph’s nose. Unfortunately, his oxygen was dipping a little low, so they had to put oxygen up his nose. He did not like that. It made him breathe very short breaths out his nose. But fortunately his oxygen level went right back up.
He finally passed out about 11 o’clock.
We were admitted to a room about midnight. I told him he was in his own room and we were staying a few days. He said “yea.” His fever was spiking again so they put a cold washcloth on his forehead. He was on some strong intravenous antibiotics. That night was one of extremely little sleep for Mommy. His monitors were going off every 30 minutes with oxygen levels as low as 84. Doctors and nurses were coming in every 30 minutes to check vitals, get info from me, change out meds, etc. They kept asking me if he was a vaginal delivery or c-section. I found that odd since he’s 6 years old. I know vaginal delivery helps clear out lungs. Maybe they were doing a study?
By the next morning, he was feeling a little better and had at least a slight appetite. The menu is definitely catered to kids. He ordered pancakes, bacon (to share with Daddy) and hot chocolate. The pancakes were Mickey Mouse. It was so cute. He didn’t like the bacon… wasn’t good like Daddy’s.
Later that day Grandma brought Katie to visit. She brought him a little Sponge Bob. They went on a walk together and he showed her “his hotel.”
They had neat carvings in the walls. William loved that one of the handprints fit his EXACTLY.
They searched for one to fit Katie, but were unable to locate one. Her hand was too small. And they were quite amused to see that Mommy’s hand was way to big for all of them.
We have determined we have little faith in stethoscopes. Eight people had listened to his lungs before his chest x-ray and no one heard the pneumonia. We were all shocked by the diagnosis… especially the severity. Apparently this type of pneumonia and location of it is one of the most commonly missed. That and our little guy is a squirmy one to examine.
Another restless night. Lots of TV watching and computer playing. Chris and I took turns going home to shower. We were in the hospital until Monday afternoon. William got a nice surprise of balloons, a stuffed animal tiger he named “cat” and a UT football game from Mommy’s friends. Thank you!
Before we were discharged, we were informed his blood cultures had come back normal. Poor thing was so tired that he passed out in the car on the way to the pharmacy.
We were given two strong antibiotic prescriptions. The Pharmacist at the hospital told us that both were going to taste bad in liquid form. She recommended getting the capsules and opening them up, sprinkling the contents into some yogurt or something. Let me tell you she has obviously never tried this stuff! The Cefdinir down, but the Clindamycin tasted like very strong window cleaner! He eventually got it all down, gagging all the way. Chris and I both tasted it and realized there was no way we could get him to take this 3x a day for 10 days. Three minutes later he threw it all up. We decided to try to teach him how to swallow pills in the morning. We tested with skittles. It just wasn’t happening. This is a kid who takes 2 and a half minutes to eat ONE SKITTLE. That’s just how well he chews his food.
Back to Dr. Joe we went for our follow-up today. He changed our prescriptions to liquid form for us. We got flavors added and William is such a little trooper getting those down. He’s doing much better today! He’ll go back to school tomorrow, then can even stay for YMCA aftercare the following day. We’re going to keep him out of soccer this week. He should be good to return next week.
We sure are glad this incident is over. Hopefully his future spring breaks will be much better.
