First up - Bloody
hell.
So. Blogo-post ahoy. I've skipped a fair bit here as it's late, I've only been home for a few hours and I can barely remember the last few days anyway.
Hella week, really. First Born got rather ill last Thursday. Fever and a rash and all sorts of unpleasantness. We took him to the doctors as he had a massive 104 temperature, and they thought he had another ear infection. He had some antibiotics and yet got worse over the next couple of days. We took him to the local hospital on Sunday morning, who thought he had a viral rash and suggested we go to Gloucester hospital childrens' ward for him to be checked out proper-like.
So, we take him there and so starts the Magical Medical Tour, where the excitable registrars (no doubt with an eye on their next publication) change diagnosis on a daily basis. We started off with Kawasaki's Disease (not "being nynfortoo and hitting a tractor", as it turns out, but I'd figured that as First Born can't ride a manual), moved on with a viral thing, then a bacterial thing, then meningitis, then some random kidney disease as well, as by Monday morning it's apparent First Born's kidneys aren't working properly, and are letting too much protein through. From the first night there it's made clear that First Born is seriously, seriously ill, bordering on life threatening.
This isn't good, obviously, so we're a smidge worried.
So some time is spent being wound up by indecisive doctors.
First Born has also been a bit upset. For instance, we were waiting for an ultrasound of his kidneys yesterday afternoon, and he spent a good ten minutes screaming at full tilt. None of the doctors or nurses in the ultrasound department thought it might be a good idea to make one of the
four adults they saw before us wait for five fucking minutes in order to let the little guy be in and out quicker.
So, First Born has been going absolutely fucking bonkers being in hospital (by this morning he was spending every waking moment screaming "daddy home"), and as his temperature had come down the last three days, his platelet count is up and the protein in his urine has gone down (all good things meaning he's getting less sick and whatever they were doing or weren't doing is making him better) they let us take him home after Mrs C and I had some very strong words with the paediatric consultant. And so, for the first night in five days, he's now gone to sleep without screaming, and didn't need me to hold him for two hours before he'd go off.
The nurses have been phenomenal, though. Despite First Born having a powerful phobia of medical staff (one only exacerbated by having so much blood drawn and also having an interfering consultant fuck up the insertion of an IV line his junior was trying to do. I nearly asked him if he need a a nurse to help him with it) they've been brilliant with him, and have made a shitty, shitty week slightly less excremental.
So, we're home, he's some better, but we still need to take him back to hospital the next few days for more treatment, and there's still the outside chance he may have long term kidney damage, but that chance is receding. They still don't know what the fuck the problem has been, and we likely never will. Although it sounds as if it was actually meningitis after all, to me.
Ultimately, though, the thing that has most annoyed me about this week was that in all of the visits by the consultant and his gaggle of registrars and SHOs and med students, not one of them, not one motherfucking man jack of them, suggested during their discussions of his symptoms that the problem might be Lupus. Honestly, I weep for our medical profession. I really do. How can you fix someone until you've nearly killed them treating them for Lupus?
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poor little boy.
We are down to our last 9 weeks now!!
