The Beeping

We had a very exciting weekend! On Friday afternoon Addy felt a little warm and I took her temperature: 101.5. I called the pediatrician's office to find out how much Tylenol to give a 9 pounder. The nurse on-call said that I have to take her to the ER. I argued that she just has a little fever and I only wanted to know how much Tylenol to give. Nope, gotta take her to the ER. Okay, so we go to the ER and the doctors explain that because she's only 4 weeks old, they have to find the reason for the fever. So they take blood and urine samples and do a spinal tap.

Jake leaves to get the kids from school and Addy and I wait for the test results. Finally, the doctor tells me that most of the really awful illnesses that she could have are ruled out. However, not all the results are in and partly because of her age and partly because of her VSD (the heart hole) we need to be admitted for 48 hours. It takes the nurses 3 tries to get the IV in her hand, but they finally succeed and we are sent upstairs to the pediatric ward.

The room is small -- a bed for me and a newborn crib for Addy, a tv, a bathroom. Addy is receiving the normal IV fluid and 3 different kinds of antibiotics (just to be safe) that are all on different schedules. The IV machine beeps when a medication needs to be added, when a medication has finished and when the tubing gets a kink. It actually beeps ALL the time. A nurse has to come in and determine the cause and reset it.

So all day on Saturday doctors and nurses come and go and I'm told that there is blood in the spinal tap sample. We have to stay until sometime on Monday, when the test results from that come back. I'm told later that it took 3 tries to do the spinal tap and that is most likely the origin of the blood, not some horrible disease.

Jake and the kids visited us on Saturday and we had a good time. There's a really nice playroom in the ward and because the hospital is pretty quiet on weekends we got to take the Radio Flyer wagon all over the place. Rambler demonstrated why it's not a good idea to stand up in the wagon even when it's stopped-- good thing we were already in the hospital! He was fine.

Jake got a horrible headache on Sunday and somehow managed the two kids. My parents took them for awhile so he could visit us though. The hospital fed me, but it was well, hospital food. Since I couldn't leave the room without someone watching Addy, I was holed up there pretty much the whole time. Joan and Roy sent balloons and they really brightened up the room. I tied them to Addy's crib and she really enjoyed watching them sway. Kristy brought me pizza and reading material. Both were much needed. I was so happy it was shark week on Discovery Channel but I still ended up watching a lot of crappy tv.

Nurses and doctors came and went and the beeping was out of control. Finally, we were released on Monday around 2:00. All tests came back negative. Addy just had a virus. We had such a great night's sleep last night!

Thank you so much to everyone who helped us out -- and to those who offered but we didn't let them. Some of you (Kim & Juli) we didn't want to have you come to the hospital in case Addy was going to spread some awful germ that you were then going to take to your little ones. We really appreciate everyone's thoughtfulness and kindness!!