PICU

Two weeks ago David had a short, but somewhat scary stay in the local pediatric intensive care unit due to a high fever of unknown origin. After all night of screaming inconsolably, and after saying many prayers for his comfort AND for our sanity, I thought to take his temperature. It wasn't high by my veteran mother standards, but I suspected at his age it was considered a medical emergency. A 5 a.m. call to the pediatrician confirmed that we needed to get him to the emergency room STAT. We called my Mom who came right away to stay with the other children and we quickly packed up and sped off to the ER. We got to cut to the ahead of the line due to his age (and his volume) and he was admitted almost immediately after being evaluated. He had to endure a battery of tests, including a spinal tap, to rule out septic infection. Fortunately, they all came back with favorable results, though he was treated the same as if he had anthrax as a preventive measure. Not really, of course, but they did take it very seriously, as well they should have. He was in isolation for the first 36 hours and was on two IV antibiotics and fluid IVs for 48+ hours. He responded quickly, and thankfully that was the end of that. He got to come home before spending a third night. He has made a full recovery and is thriving. His weight at the time he was discharged showed a gain of just one ounce less than two pounds over his birth weight, and he had grown an inch and a half.

Lots has happened since then. I wish I had time to write more. Not only for the reading pleasure of my many, MANY (tee hee) fans, but also because the time is passing so quickly and this was supposed to be a kind of a journal to document my days of parenting for my own benefit and record...as in a journal...as in entries which are posted daily, or weekly, or even bi-weekly...yeah, I'm going to work on that along with maybe one or two other shortcomings I have.