Monday, May 5, 2014

Waiting For the Shoe To Drop

A month ago, J was as sick as he's ever been since his discharge from the NICU. For a 26-weeker, he has always been amazingly healthy, even in the NICU. We have had plenty of frustrations and roadblocks, but he has never been truly ill.

In fact, he went an entire year without a sick visit to his pediatrician.

But, this year he had one cold after another cold after an ear infection. All winter long. I guess I shouldn't be surprised. He attends school for twice as many hours a week as he did last winter, and now he has a younger sister who shares germs with him. The cold and flu season was also much longer because of the colder winter.

So, it was nothing new to have two kids with ear infections in late March. I took them to the doctor on a Tuesday afternoon, and both kids needed antibiotics. M started looking better almost immediately, but J became listless on Wednesday, which has never happened before. He rarely runs a fever, he has never lost his appetite, and sitting on the couch all day is the exact opposite of the kind of child he is. But, I really became alarmed on Wednesday night when he had trouble sleeping, so on Thursday morning, I took him back to the doctor. I was positive that something was wrong.

And I was right.

Apparently, the antibiotic was working on the bacteria in his ears, which looked much better, but while his body was busy with that infection, another bacteria attacked his lungs. Within 36 hours of seeing a doctor for ear infections, he had developed a completely separate case of pneumonia.

So, the doctor gave him a shot of Rocephin, a high-powered injectable antibiotic, and she changed his prescription to a stronger oral antibiotic.

But, he didn't get better. In fact, all of Thursday he continued to go downhill. I called Friday morning and made the first available doctor's appointment, which, of course because I was in a panic, was at 10:45 a.m. J's fever was nearly uncontrollable, and his skin was so pale it was nearly translucent. His lips weren't blue--a sign of danger I learned in the NICU--but he was wheezing. So, I called the doctor's office back and told them that I was bringing him right then.

The doctor saw him immediately, and she gave him another Rocephin injection, a dose of steroids, and two breathing treatments.

That night, I began to see him turning a corner.

I learned at a follow-up appointment the next week that his case of pneumonia was aggressive and that if he hadn't responded that day to all the medicines, she would have hospitalized him.

What amazed me was not how vicious pneumonia can be, because I was hospitalized for it twice as a kid. What shocked me was how fast J went from being mildly sick to dangerously sick. I asked if his prematurity had anything to do with the rapid progression of the pneumonia, and the doctor told me no. He's never showed signs of lung damage or asthma before (amazingly), and now that he's nearly four, many of his risk factors for illnesses are no different than other children.

Whatever made J so sick was just an awful virus or bacteria. J and M had mirror illnesses, but she had her last Synagis shot the day I took the kids to the doctor for ear infections. She improved immediately, so maybe the Synagis shot boosted her immune system. Or maybe it was just a fluke that J caught something else.

I thought I was managing the stress of having a sick child, but I'll admit it: I almost had a nervous breakdown when the nurse put the oxygen mask on J for his first breathing treatment. It was another of those NICU flashbacks! I was transported back to that time when he was so tiny and his breathing was so labored and I couldn't see his face for all the tubes. But, what kept me from teetering over the edge was J's need for me. I didn't want him to know that his illness was scary.

When we left the NICU with J, I always felt like I was waiting for the other shoe to drop. It was inevitable. All of our good fortune would catch up with us. I just knew it. A baby can't be born as early as J under such emergency circumstances and have no complications. It just seems impossible to me.

Even more miraculous is that when the other shoe did drop and J had a terrible case of pneumonia, he wasn't a baby or even a toddler. It wasn't the result of RSV. And the doctor didn't treat him any differently because he was a preemie. He was just a kid who got really sick.

Do you know what that means to me?

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