My week in review.
I wanted to share a few thoughts and thanks from the past week. If you haven’t been keeping up this story was most bizarre and nerve racking. First of all Emma Elaine and I are all home. We came home about 11:30 Last night (Friday).
Here is the “Cliff notes” version.
Saturday a week ago, Emma came in complaining that her tummy hurt and that she thought she was hungry. She got a snack and ate a little bit, realizing that it made her hurt more and stopped eating. Later that evening, we had life group and had prepared a nice dinner. At that time Emma was not feeling very well and definitely did not want to eat. We just thought that she had an upset stomach. We gave prevecid to ease her stomach. After life group we noticed that she still did not feel well and we put her to bed.
Later that night about 11:00 Emma woke Elaine complaining that her stomach hurt even more. We put her to bed with us hoping that she would calm down. After 2 hours of her tossing and turning I got up and gave her some Tylenol and had her try to poop with no results.
About 2:30 I noticed that Elaine got up and started getting dressed. This was not a good sign as I new where we were going.
We brought Emma to the Emergency room of Cook Children’s Medical Canter. We arrived about 3:00am. We saw the triage nurse Eric. He is the same one we see every time we have come down. He even recognized us, Took a quick look at Emma noticing her color and said, “Come on back!”. There we sat in room 35 of Cook’s Emergency Department for the next 12 hours.
The first ER doc came in to take a look at Emma and called for an X-ray to see what they could see. They noticed that she was blocked and could probably use an enema. They gave Emma the Enema, which Emma did not like at all. (Who could blame her?)
After some good results of the enema, we were back at room 35 and although her stomach pain went down a little bit for a few minutes, it came back much stronger.
The doctor then called for an ultra sound. We were then taken to ultrasound for a while. Then back to room 35. About this time I was really done with Animal Planet…
The 2nd shift doc came to introduce himself to us and mentioned that he really did not like what he found on the ultrasound. I should say that at this time I had really not had my mind around the fact that Emma was in serious trouble. I guess my first clue that we had a big problem was when the doc said, “the surgeon would like for us to do a CT scan. OK, so now a surgeon is involved.
We were given the “contrast” to drink for the CT scan. About 16 ounces of fluid for Emma to drink, on a cramped stomach. Emma really gave it the college try and took tiny sips. She got one of the cups down and started gagging and actually threw up a couple of times.
The Radiologist came back and took us back to the scan. We did the scan fairly quickly and back to room 35 again. This was about 1:00p on Sunday. At this time we began to get visitors. Ben Minnie, David and Julie.
After about an hour, we met our Surgeon, Dr, T or Thomas. He began to explain that Emma’s bowels were constricted and blocked due to 8 years of scar tissue building up from Emma’s original surgery. And the best way to deal with it was to go in and cut it out. We no sooner said, that sounds like a good idea, than they came in to prep her for surgery. I should say that at this point I was very nervous.
We went upstairs to surgery prep about 3:30 Sunday Afternoon and into surgery around 4:00p. Surgery lasted about 4 hours.
We went up to our room about 8:30 Sunday night. I went home to feed the pets and get changes of clothes. I arrived back at the room about 11:00 that night. One of the longest days I have ever had.
The rest was basically a blur. Lots of visitors, walks and no sleep.
Sorry for taking so long for the short version.
The one thing that really impressed and surprised me, was the amount of people that I knew along the way that was supportive.
Starting with our paramedic whom we went to high school with Morris Foster.
Nurses and hospital staff that Elaine has worked with before in the surgery prep and recovery room, Anesthesiologists and even a floor nurse on our first night in the room.
I cannot express my thanks for the prayers, visits, cards, letters, stuffed animals, that have made their way into Emma’s life this past week. Without them, We would have been sunk. Thanks again.
