I’m sitting hear feeling a bit of anxiety. I have a cold, nothing serious, but anytime there is illness in our house it makes me nervous. I’ve mentioned The D’s asthma before and the issues is has caused us since he was diagnosed 2 1/2 years ago. But, I don’t think I’ve ever detailed the day I thought he was going to die.
I’m not sure describing the day in detail will help me with my anxiety, but at least I will be doing something besides ruminating about whether he will catch this particular cold and whether it will cause him major problems or not.
So….here is what happened two 1/2 years ago…
It was actually The G’s 4th birthday. The week before The D had spent two days in the hospital. We started on a new medication after that and The D seemed to be improving. The G had caught what appeared to be a minor cold during that time, but we didn’t think much of that. The G’s birthday was on a Monday. Sunday, The D started to have a runny nose. Overnight, he started coughing. I spent much of the night giving him Albuterol treatments every two hours.
He didn’t seem to be doing that great when we go up on Monday morning. The Husband had an important meeting at work and left around 7:45am. I called the on-call pediatrician to see whether I should take The D to the ER or wait until their office hours started at 8:30. This particular on-call pediatrician was one of my least favorites and his response was “Well, you can do either.” That was pretty infuriating because of course I realized that I could do either thing. I wanted to say “No, shit! I’m looking for a recommendation!” At this point, I decided to wait for office hours because that would give my good friend time to drop her daughter off at school and come get The G. That was the one saving grace of the day, that The G didn’t have to witness any of this.
We walked into the clinic at 8:35am and they brought us back immediately. A different on-call pediatrician was there and he said, “Well, he’s going back in the hospital.” Unfortunately, they had no bed available. So, the doctor took care of all the lab work and x-rays. Finally about noon, we got a call that a bed was ready and the doctor, a nurse and The D and I walked over the hospital. (It’s less than a block away from our clinic.)
Things were going OK. The doctor started The D’s IV, he was on oxygen. We’d been there for about 45 minutes when The D started getting really agitated. I was about to call for the nurse when she came in away. She must have recognized what was about to happen because she shouted for the doctor to come.
The next thing I know The D was limp in my arms and grey. The doctor ripped him out of my arms and laid him on the bed. I stood up and stepped a few steps back. I can clearly remember thinking, “Oh fuck! I am watching my kid die right in front of me!” The next thing I knew the room was FILLED with people and equipment.
They must have worked on him for awhile, although I have no sense of how long. It was long enough that I was able to call The Husband at work to tell him that he needed to come right away. He kept asking why and the only thing I could say was, “It’s bad. You just need to come.” The anesthesiologist came and let me know that they wouldn’t be intubating him just yet because that could make things worse, but that they would be watching him.
Finally things calmed down a bit and the doctor told me that he would be trying to find him an ICU bed at one of the children’s hospitals in the metropolitan areas to the north of us. The Husband finally arrived. At some point, the helicopter crew arrived. They got him loaded up and took him away.
That was actually almost as bad as watching him get so sick in front of me. Everyone told me he was stable and things should be fine, that the helicopter trip was only 20 minutes and then he would be under the watchful eyes of a pediatric critical care specialist. What no one tells you in a situation like that is that you have to drive for at least 90 minutes before you see your child.
For us, because of the time of day, it turned out to be almost 3 hours. We hit the metropolitan area right at rush hour. The last 5 miles to the hospital took about 90 minutes. I think we could have walked it faster.
But, we finally made it and we were reunited with The D. We were able to talk with the doctor. We got our first taste of a teaching hospital (trying to convince my husband that those weren’t college kids coming in to talk to us…they were 3rd or 4th year medical students at least).
I know that this whole experience has changed me and how I look at things. I sometimes think that it has changed The D, as well. He’s far more clingy than The G ever was. Even now he always seems to be worried about where The Husband or I am and when or whether we’re coming back. I just don’t know what a 2 year old can remember or how they interpret what they remember from that early of an age.
So, this is why I always face every cold and flu season with a little fear and trepidation.
