He's a little bigger than this now, but this is the most recent picture of Connor that I have. He just gave Ron and I the scariest night we have ever had as parents. Now remember that we have had our share of sick kids starting with Andrew being 9 week premature and in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit for 2 months and continuing through a Christmas Day 2003 emergency room visit with Tyler for apparently swallowing a puzzle piece, we have never been through anything like last Wednesday night. Connor had been sick since Sunday night, Feb. 19th. It just seemed like a cold that was getting worse. After Ron and the kids came home from church on Wednesday night Ron commented that I should make a doctor's appointment the next day for Connor because he was not getting better. Ron went on to bed while I tried to get Connor comfortable enough to sleep. At about 11:00 pm he started crying in a way I had not heard before and I would try to change positions or walk around with him and I could get him to clam down for a few minutes. Then about midnight nothing I did would calm him down. He sounded especially bad because he had lost his voice the day before because of the cold or the crying - I'm not sure which. About 1:00am I went upstairs to where Ron was trying to sleep and told him I couldn't do anything for Connor. Ron held him for a couple minutes and then said "Ok, let's go." We headed to the hospital on the other side of Springfield because we knew they had Peds. We arrived at the ER (Connor screaming the whole time) and were taken very quickly back to a room. They started to work Connor up - history and physical, draw blood, swab his nose, sent him for an xray. All the while Connor is SCREAMING. They check to make sure he didn't have a scratched eye or a hair wrapped around a finger or toe - anything the try to figure out why he was so inconsolable. At one point I was holding Connor and he started forcing his head back which made the doctor start thinking meningitis. She took Connor out of my arms and laid him down on his back on the bed and started talking to us about doing a spinal tap - which Ron let her know very quickly that he was not opposed to that. At that point, the doctor decided to wipe the gunk(is that a word?) out of Connor's eyes and nose and as she did that all of a sudden he sucked in a deep breath and stopped!! It was quickly obvious that he was no moving air - Ron grabbed him off the bed and put him upright trying to help him . Ron had Connor facing away from him and toward me and I could see the changes going on all over that little face and I knew right away that he could not move any air. I think I said to Ron twice "He's not breathing!!" At that point, Ron went into doctor mode and started barking out orders. The first thing he said was, "This baby needs to be intubated." (Which means a tube down his throat to breath for him). As soon as he said that I immediately grabbed my phone, left the room and called our parents to get them praying. When I came back in the room, they were bagging Connor (forcing air into his lungs) and since he responded they did not need to intubate him. They continued bagging him until it was clear that he was breathing on his own and then they put him on an oxygen mask. At that point his labs came back and Connor had tested positive for RSV and they decided to send him to another hospital better equipped to handle it. We decided we wanted him sent to Children's Hospital in Columbus and they worked on getting him transferred and calling the helicopter.
There is so much of this story that I am leaving out because it would take way too long to write and I'm not that good of a writer, but I can tell you that the hardest decision we made that night was to send Connor off in the helicopter without one of us with him. I wanted Ron to go because I wanted him to be there to make any decisions that needed to be made and he wanted me to go because he didn't want me to drive by myself. In the end we chose to trust the Lord and the helicopter crew with Connor and for Ron and I to go together in the car.
To make a very long night and day and night and day short by the time we got to the ER in Columbus we could see improvement, by the time he was admitted to the Infections Disease floor we could see more improvement and each couple of hours we could see even more improvement until he was ready to go home on Friday night.
RSV is a virus that looks like a cold and most of the time doesn't go beyond that. However, in babies can be very dangerous. Premature infants are particularly vunerable to his virus. As a virus there is no treatment other than time. The doctors and hospitals can give support in the way of oxygen, but cannot do anything other than support the baby and the parents through the progression on the virus.
We are extremely thankful for
- Ron not getting a ticket or in an accident while driving as quickly as possible,
- the Springfield ER staff who resonded quickly in this emergency and once Connor was stable made quick arrangements to get Connor to the best place for him even with Dad breathing down their necks,
- a helicopter crew who knew what they were doing and took good care of Connor without Mom and Dad breathing down their necks,
- the Columbus ER staff who assessed Connor quickly to get him to the right floor,
- the Infections Disease doctors, residents, medical students who know how to care for babies like Connor,
- the nurses who know how to care for babies like Connor and Moms and Dads of babies like Connor,
- family you can call in the middle of the night knowing they will start praying immediately,
- friends who won't yell at you for calling before 7am, who step in immediately with meals, rides for the other kids, phone calls to check up on Mom and Dad,
- Andrew and Joellyn who took over at home with taking care of Brandon and Tyler, feeding themselves, and keeping the house picked up, and finally
- to Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior who gives a peace that passes all understanding.
Happy ending - Connor came home very late on Friday night as continues to do well. He is still sick with a bad cold, but breathing normally, being cute and making the rest of the family very happy. He and his mom (me) will not be going anywhere for a long while.
