Our Kind of Wonderful

This little guy gave us quite the scare a few nights ago.

It had been a normal Tuesday.  I woke up, got Kaylee off on the bus, then took Jadyn and Tyler to her gymnastics class.  He was my usual Ty - running around the upstairs waiting area, playing with his cars, making me chase him down the stairs, and pulling at my legs to hold him so he could see over the balcony.  I stopped to get the two of them lunch before dropping lil' J off at preschool and took Tyler to a friend's house for babysitting co-op so he could take his nap while I ran a couple errands.  After we got home and Kaylee off the bus, I put a movie on for the kids while I made some preparations for dinner.  Tyler was sitting on the couch with his sisters and had fallen asleep.  I found it odd since he had already taken his nap, but they had all been fighting off little colds, so I figured he just wasn't feeling well.  He was only asleep for 15 minutes before he was up again, running around and playing.  Dinner came and he sat on my lap and ate like normal, but as I was cleaning up, I noticed him laying down on the floor.  Again, I just brushed it off to him being congested.  About 30 minutes later, I was sitting on the couch folding laundry and Ty climbed up and cuddled into me.  His head felt a little warm, but definitely not feverish - so I pulled him close to me and enjoyed the snuggles.  He laughed at his big sisters who were being silly and dancing around the living room.  A few minutes later I got up to switch the laundry.  As soon I sat back down with him, I realized something was wrong. 

It didn't look like a typical seizure.  His body was still - everything was in his face.  His eyes were rolled back and looking to the side, the right side of his face was twitching, and he was making this short gasping sound. I cradled him in my arms and heard myself say over and over "Tyler, look at Mama.  Look at Mama, Baby."  But there was no response.  In a panic, I rushed him to our bathroom where Josh was taking a shower and showed him what was happening.  Josh hurried out and called 911 as I sat with Tyler in the living room.  It took the ambulance over 6 minutes to get to us.  I remember we were almost yelling at the dispatcher, "Where are they? Where are they? Are they coming?"  There is a paramedic station literally right next to our neighborhood and we couldn't figure out why it was taking so long.  And when you feel like you're losing your baby boy, 6 minutes is an eternity.  As I sat with him on my lap, Tyler started spitting out this mucusy liquid and his face was changing color.  I can't even describe it as him turning blue - it's like all the color had been drained from his face.  And he was still seizing. 

Finally the swirl of red and white lights reflected through our front window.  The second the first EMT walked through our door I passed Ty over to him. "Please help him!" I cried.  They did a quick assessment of him in the house, then swooped him off to the ambulance.  I came too.  Josh got a hold of my parents who thankfully live only a couple minutes away from the hospital, then loaded up the girls to follow behind us.  The ambulance ride is still a bit of a blur.  I remember the paramedic asking me a bunch of questions and how hard it was to concentrate enough to answer them.  I couldn't stop my legs from shaking.  The paramedics quickly gave Tyler something to bring down the fever.  His little body had gone from a normal temperature to 102 degrees in a matter of minutes. They also hooked him up to oxygen since he was having trouble breathing.  About 5 minutes into the ride, one of the EMTs looked over at me and with a calm, but nervous tone told me that he was unconscious.  My heart dropped even further.  At one point, I remember looking up to heaven and thinking, "Really God? Really??"  We had already been through so much, and now this...

 As we pulled up to the hospital, I watched as the EMT scooped Tyler up in his arms.  He looked so tiny, so fragile.  I followed close behind.  I remember seeing the faces of people as we passed by - overwhelmed with concern for our baby boy, and pity for me.  As we made it down the hallway and into the room, doctors and nurses swarmed in behind us. The room quickly filled with 10-15 people, all with a job to do.  Within seconds he was hooked up to an IV, machines hooked up to his head and chest, and they were putting tubes down his throat to open his airway.  I stood to the side, still shaking, and completely clueless to what was going on.  In fact, the only words I remember hearing was from one of the male doctors who said, "stop! you're going to hurt his jaw!"  There was more people asking me questions and having me sign forms.  They were nice enough, and doing there best to give me assurance that he was in good hands, but I didn't want to talk about insurance or addresses or birth dates.  I just wanted to know what was happening with my baby boy.  I wanted to hear the doctors and know what they were doing.  I wanted someone, anyone, to tell me what was wrong with my little Tyler.  Josh arrived in the midst of the craziness and he didn't have to say a word - he just put his arm around me and with one look, I knew we were thinking the same thing. "This can't be happening." 

After giving him a tranquilizer, his seizure finally stopped.   By this time it had gone on for close to 20 minutes. They put a splint over his arm to stop him from pulling out the IV and a tiny oxygen mask over his little mouth. It was shaped like a dinosaur.  As quickly as the room filled with people, it emptied.  And we were still confused.  Eventually a doctor came in and told us that they were assuming it was a febrile seizure - which occurs in young children when there is a sudden spike in temperature.  It actually happens to 1 in 20 children and in 2/3 of cases never happens again. The biggest concerns for Tyler was how long the seizure lasted (typically febrile seizures last less than 2 minutes but his was 10 times that) and the fact that the seizure didn't run its course on its own.  They had us wait a couple hours until his temperature had gone down and sent us home with instructions to keep him in our room with us and wake him up every two hours to alternate the Ibuprofen and Tylenol.  As we walked out of the hospital, all the nurses at the front station watched with smiles - so relieved to see him alert and sporting rosy red cheeks.  It had been a crazy busy night in the ER (my mom said there were probably 80 people in the waiting room) but the staff went above and beyond for us - they even brought my parents and girls back into a special quiet room where they gave Kaylee and Jadyn popsicles and a movie to watch. The EMTs waited at the hospital to make sure he was okay before they left.  Everyone was concerned about the sweet little baby in Room 5.
The next day, we took Tyler to see our pediatrician.  He sat down and talked with us for close to an hour.  We had a lot of questions.  He confirmed what the ER doctor had said - that it was most likely a febrile seizure, but given my history with epilepsy (I had benign rolandic epilepsy for a couple years when I was 10) they couldn't rule out a seizure disorder either.  Basically he told us that he didn't think it would happen again but that he couldn't promise anything.  Our biggest question was - where do we go from here?  I mean, what if it had happened at night in his crib?  He had been sleeping through the night for months, so we usually didn't even sleep with the monitor on anymore. Will I be able to leave him with a babysitter?  How do I even let him out of my sight?  The doctor understood our concerns, but reminded us that we couldn't keep him in a bubble.  We needed to treat him like a normal boy, the same way we had always done.  And if it did happen again - we do the same thing - get him to a hospital as soon as possible.  He told us that it was going to be hard, but that in time we'd worry less and less and that eventually life would feel normal again.  Right now that seems impossible, but I know he's right.

Today was the first day we felt like we had our sweet, happy little Ty back. It took a few days for him to completely get rid of his fever, but thankfully no more seizures.  We've started letting him sleep in his crib again, but not without keeping the monitor on (as awful as it sounds, it's been a bit of blessing for me that he has been so congested because it helps me know he's still breathing!) and checking on him every couple hours through the night.  We are just so, so thankful that he is okay.  I never thought watching him do something as simple as pushing his little cars around the train table could warm my heart so much.  And for the record, I think we could go about 20 more years without another reminder of how precious life is!