The last 24 hours have been a hellish roller coaster of emotions for our family. Last night Zach, our 11 year old son with Cystic Fibrosis, ended up being rushed to the ER and admitted into th PICU.
After school yesterday Zach seemed fine. I picked him up and he was excited about the feild trip they had taken to the IMax Theatre and Chic-fil-a. We got home and he did what he normal does after school, unwound with the Xbox for a little while. We picked his father up from work at 5pm and went home and had dinner about 6:30. After dinner he did his chest therapy and played Xbox with dad. At 7:30 he told us he was going to bed and off he went.
About 1/2 hour later I heard him make a gagging/coughing noise and called out to him expecting him to tell me he was fine. He didn't answer and his sister went to check on him. About the same time he walked into the livingroom in a daze and projectile puked all over the floor. So I was thinking "ok stomach bug, no big deal" took him in the bathroom, where he puked more and got him cleaned up. As I was cleaning him up his dad went into his bedroom and found that he had puked all over his bed and there were blankets on the floor covered in puke. I told his dad to take the pukey stuff over to my mother-in-laws (about 3 mins away) and throw them in the wash so they don't stink. As he was gone, I finished cleaning Zach up and put him back in bed with a bucket and cool cloth on his forward, as I would for any of my kids when they have the stomach bug.
About 5 minutes later, enough time for me to clean up the puke off the livingroom floor, I heard the gagging/coughing sound again and me and my daughter rush to the bedroom. Zach is sitting on the bed puking into the blankets. I tried to get him to take the bucket to puke in but he couldn't follow even simple commands. This is when I realize that something is seriously wrong with my son. I call his dad and tell him to get home now he has to go to ER.
We rush him to Baptist Hospital in Jacksonville, about a 5 minute drive (which seemed like 30) and it was like a scene out of ER or Chicago Hope. I run into the ER with my son in my arms, not responding to me, not able to focus on anything and gagging, screamin "somebody help me now!" I swear every patient in the ER waiting room was looking at me, and a nurse from the adult ER pointed and told me to go to the children's, while I was thinking "SCREW YOU JUST HELP ME!"
While I am waiting for them to get us (literally about 2 minutes if that, but seemed like forever) one patient tells me "there's a bathroom right there don't let him puke out here". "REALLY!!!!! THE KID CAN'T STAND OR FUNCTION AND SHE WANTS ME TO TAKE HIM IN A BATHROOM!!! About this time, the nurse opens the triage door and as she is forcing the family in it out the back of it is rushing us in. They rush us right back to a room, where once again it was like walking into an episode of ER there were a TON of Doctors and Nurses waiting for him. They immediatly hook him up to IV's and try to get him to respond and nothng is working. They started talking like they think he took an overdose of something or something. So they drew blood, put a catheter in and took urine, hooked up EKG leads and O2 monitors. I AM FREAKED OUT! The kid still isn't responding to anyone and can't focus on anything.
They finally get some blood results back and find out that his sodium level was dangerously low. The ER doc says that that explains all the symptoms and that he was admitting my son into the PICU so they can administer hypertonic saline solution and slowly bring the level back up.
So for the first few hours in the PICU things kind of just went on. Zach would wake up confused, look at us like he was lost, fight a little and go back to sleep. About 4am Zach wakes up and stripes all the blankets off himself (he is butt-naked under them) and tries to climb out of bed. I try to talk him back into bed but end up having to physically restrain him, a nurse has to come in and help me and he just more combatative and anger. I asked him if he knew his name, he didn't. did he know who I was, he didn't. did he know where he was, he didn't. he didn't know anything! More nurses have to come in and help hold him down. He is screaming and kicking and crying, yelling at us to "leave him alone" and "help him". I lose it. I have to leave the room. I can't stand watching them physically restrain my son. They were trying to put restraints on him and get ativan in him and calm him down, but I just couldn't take it. I ran!
Once I was calmed down and could breathe myself again, I went back to the room (maybe 15 mins). They had gotten 3 restraints on him and had given him 2 doses Ativan, and he was still going off about every 5 mins! it took another 15 mins before he was finally out.
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