Henry and I had quite the adventure this week.
Sunday, Derek brought him home early from church. He had been up much of the night coughing and was so tired. He almost immediately took an hour nap once they got home. When I got home, I tried (and failed) to get him to eat, then took him to the bath to try and help him relax a little. Well, I noticed a bunch of little hives all over his back and tummy. Not a ton, but enough to be noticeable. We figured it was probably the cough medicine that Derek had run to get that morning at 6am--all CVS had left was some random homeopathic recipe, something Henry hadn't ever had.
By the time Henry woke up from his second nap that afternoon, they were covering his trunk and moved on to his arms and legs. Before he went to bed, I called the on-call doctor to see what we should do. She said it sounded like a viral rash, which would accompany the coughing. However, she warned me that if it moved to his face and anywhere near his mouth I would need to take him to the emergency room.
So, at the request of Henry and to my relief, Derek slept next to Henry for most of the night. And by that, I mean Derek pulled the crib mattress out from under Henry's bed and slept on that with one of Henry's toddler size blankets. Of course I offered to get him a real blanket etc., but Daddy insisted that was enough. I was so grateful, though. It meant I got to get a little bit of sleep, knowing Henry was under the semi-sleepy but at least watchful eye of his Daddy.
Derek left for work around 7, telling me he couldn't see much of Henry's face and didn't want to wake him. I agreed, and fell back asleep.
Henry usually gets up around 8:30 or 9 these days, so when 9:30 rolled around I figured he was just tired from the rough night. At 10, I started getting a little worried and went in to check on him. I actually woke him up which surprised me. When he sat up and gave me his usual cheerful "hi! good!" I nearly wept--his entire face, ears, mouth, neck, hands, fingers, everything was covered in harsh red bumps.
"Well Little Brute," I said scooping him up. "Let's change your diaper and go to the dr."
I called our dr. just to make sure I HAD to take him to the ER and not to her office. I was hoping they'd say come on in--less wait time, he knows some of the nurses there, etc.--but they said they wouldn't even see him, just send us across the street to the ER. Might as well skip the step and go straight to the hospital.
I packed some fruit snacks, a full cup of water, diapers, and a bag full of chocolate covered raisins for me and headed over to Utah Valley Regional Medical Center, calling Daddy on the way.
When we arrived, the triage nurse took one look at us and said, "he better get a mask on." Thus began the screaming.
Henry HATED the mask. We were allowed to take it off once we got through the initial check-in and were in the triage room. But then they started taking Henry's vitals and he started crying and "no, no, no, no" as he pushed the nurses' hands away from him. I had to hold him down while they took his temp, his blood pressure, and checked his heart rate. He cried and reached for me when they weighed him and then measured him.
When they told him he had to wear a mask back to the examination room, I put one on myself hoping to show him it wasn't scary. Didn't work. I ended up holding it to his face while the nurses helped me carry our coats, his blanket, and his stuffed penguin, Buco back to exam room 6 where I was told we would be for the next 3-5 hours. Say what?!
Luckily, the ER Dr. assigned to us only had one patient before us, so he saw us quickly. He was very kind and very nice to Henry--he actually got him to relax a little. A little. As soon as I mentioned that Henry had been taking amoxicillin he said "ah, I bet that's what he is." I guess his daughter had a very similar reaction--no problem until the last day of the medication, just like Henry. He checked the inside of Henry's mouth and said, "no sores inside, so we can probably discount measles. However, because of the recent outbreak, we have to treat it like that until we know for certain. Unfortunately, these spots look exactly like the spots a measles victim would experience display."
So, poor Henry had a little tag placed on his head (figuratively, of course) saying--measles!
For the next three and half hours, poor little guy had a slew of nurses come in and out poking and prodding him.
A very kind male nurse took a sample from Henry's nose. He was so nice, Henry was almost smiling, until he stuck something up Henry's nose. That was the end of that friendship. (at least until he brought both of us some juice, then Henry decided he was mostly all right, because he actually looked at him). But it was nowhere near as horrible as the nurse who took a throat culture--I could relate to that. I HATED those when I had strep throat so often as a kid.
I would finally get Henry calmed down and then another nurse would come in. They had to keep checking his vitals to see if anything had changed.
About 45 minutes before we were finally released, they told me they would have to take a blood sample. I must admit, I've never felt like such a horrible human being until then. I had to hold my sick, feverish baby tight--his arms, his head, as a nurse poked him with a needle. Unfortunately the blood wasn't coming quickly, so she had to wiggle the needle around in his arm. As Henry screamed "Mama, no" over and over again, I rubbed his hair and held his right arm down. The second nurse gripped his left arm steady as the first nurse was finally able to get enough blood.
Poor Little Brute didn't want the bandage on his arm either--so I got one too. He let them put it on after that.
I was so grateful when they finally brought some Motrin for Henry, some cold water, and told us we could go home. But not without a packet of instructions.
Henry and I were both under house arrest for the next 48 hours--at least. No visitors, no leaving the house. We couldn't even stop anywhere for a drink on the way home. The Center for Infectious Diseases would either be contacting us with bad news (measles and quarantine for 14 days) or our pediatrician would call us with good news (Henry's simply allergic to the antibiotic).
I'm not going to lie--the next two days were rather miserable. Henry was fine with staying home, but it meant two very long days for this mama, waiting for the verdict from the Dr. I kept thinking about what the measles would mean for us and the fact that Henry had held his 3 week old cousin just the day before the spots showed up.
Two anxious days and two horrible nights later, I called the Dr.'s office and asked when I would hear the results. They called me back about an hour later with HAPPY news! YAY! No measles and we can go out and be normal people again.
As horrible and draining as the whole experience was, I tried to look on the bright side. First, as I sat and let people poke and prod my poor baby, I kept thinking about the mothers of children with terminal illnesses. How do they do it? How do they watch their children suffer, crying out for them to make it stop? I've always been afraid that I would be called on to endure that, and today just confirmed that I'm not sure I would be able to do it. Henry and I said a prayer when we got in the car on the way home and said thank you to our Heavenly Father for all the doctors and nurses that helped him, and prayed that we wouldn't have to go back to the hospital again.
Second--every single nurse and doctor that we came in contact with asked me if Henry was up to date on his immunizations. When I replied in the affirmative, each time they said. "Oh good. Thank you." I'm not even going to enter the debate on vaccines, because my opinion is firm and will never change. But I couldn't help but be proud that I had taken every possible step I could to take care of my baby. Sometimes, things still happen. There is always a margin of error for each vaccine (heck, I had the mumps!), but I am still so grateful that Derek and I have done what we could to keep Henry safe.
And as Derek and I prayed together each morning and night the last few days, we have offered our gratitude for modern medicine, that even if it was the measles, Henry would have the best possible care.
While we did get good news today and started giving Henry Benadryl to combat the allergic reaction, his body is still quite covered in spots. I took these pictures yesterday, and he already looked SO much better than the day before (even without the Benadryl). Seriously--he looks good here, especially his face. But perhaps you can see why I was freaking out a bit...
