Warning: if you kid looks like this- they may have a ruptured appendix. Take to the hospital right away. - This was taken in the ER before we knew what was wrong with him. Tuesday of last week my Tyson was running around the yard playing with his brother and neighbor friends. That night he ate his whole plate of food. Wednesday morning he woke up crying saying he couldn't walk and his stomach hurt. I kind of brushed it off thinking he was being dramatic but a hour later when he wouldn't walk and wanted me to carry him everywhere I decided not to send him to preschool. He said he was going to throw up- I figured he had a stomach bug. Well he never throw up and pretty much just laid on the couch and on my bed by me all day. I had to carry him if he wanted to go anywhere because his stomach hurt he said. It was just like the flu that he had a month ago. I asked him where it hurt and he said all over. After not eating and hardly drinking all day I was starting to get worried about him but as long as he was laying down he seemed totally fine. Then the next morning he woke up acting a little better. I put him in bed with Bryan and I to watch cartoons and he was talking to us and acting normal. He even started to walk around a little big and wanted to lay down on the floor by his toys to play. He even starting drinking more and he ate some fruit snacks so I figured he was doing better. He would then all of the sudden start moaning and I would say something like if you hurt that bad you would be dying, are you really hurting that bad? Later that day around 4 he went down hill fast. He was moaning and going on and wouldn't even eat a bite of yogurt. I was like "dang it Ty, you can have one bite of yogurt!" He cried and said no. I really thought he was being stubborn. I told him I was going to take him to the dr. if he didn't eat and he was upset because he didn't want to go. I was trying to use it against him sort of to talk him into trying to eat. Bryan was finally like Heather just make the call. I told Bryan that I figured if he really couldn't eat a bite of yogurt he needed to see the dr anyway so I called. I lucked out and the after hours dr was our regular pediatrician. I had to carry him up the stairs into the building and lay him on a couch while we waited then he wanted to walk back to the room. The dr came in and took a look at him and started pushing on his stomach. I had done this at home to see if it was his appendix and he didn't seem to hurt more in one place then the other. When dr. Brown did it he pushed really hard and I could tell it hurt Ty. He looked at him for at least 5-10 minutes and told me he just couldn't rule out it wasn't his appendix so he sent me over to the ER for more tests since it was after hours in their clinic and no one could do it there. So we got a wheel chair and took him over to the ER and they did some blood tests and hooked him up to a IV and started to hydrate him. I had threatened all day if he didn't drink something they would put him on IV's so I felt really bad he really did have to go on it.
Then they sent us to get a ultrasound to see if it was his appendix but his stomach was so full of gas and his rectum was so full he couldn't see any thing. I then figured he must just be backed up. I was trying to see if we could give him something to help him go and maybe get a better picture of what is going on. It hurt him really bad to go and I took him to the bathroom for about 15 minutes as he cried as he finally let some of that pain go. They told me that they wanted to do a CT scan but he would be getting a heavy dose of radiation and it may cause cancer later in life. I was thinking heck no are you doing that to my kid! I asked again if we could just do a enema or something instead of the test yet but they told me if we waited that long and it is his appendix and it burst it would be really scary. So I called my husband who was home with Blake and he suggest I call my sister in law because her kids have had a lot of health issues and has had these test ran on her kids before. She said she would do it in a heart beat because they would know what was wrong and it's a short test. So I called Bryan and told him to come to the ER and get someone to sit at our house with Blake while he slept (it was 9pm by now) and I was going to get the test done. Poor Tyson didn't want to watch TV or do anything though all of this. He kept telling me "I'm not having fun. I want to go home." I told him I wasn't having very much fun either but I couldn't tell him we were going home soon because I had no idea if we were or not. He would even tell the dr.'s he didn't hurt that bad I think because he just wanted to go home.
The CT scan wasn't my favorite. They had to pump this solution that was mostly water up his little bum and fill his large intestine to his appendix. He was asleep (so worn out by now) when we wheeled him into the room so he got woken up to the tech telling him what they were going to do next to him. Then during the test I had to stand behind the wall because I'm pregnant so he had to lay there alone. He was so upset about that. He kept asking why I left him. So the tech was so nice to him that he put a vest thing on and stood by his head so he wasn't alone. I haven't left his side the entire time so it scared him to be alone. At least the test was only about 20 seconds. He then had to sit on the toilet for about 5-10 more minutes after that to clear the water out of him. I knew he was cleaned out well by then. The tech brought him a few stickers and Ty told him he would share these with Blake. I was surprised that even though the kid was in hell with all these tests and in so much pain he was thinking about sharing with Blake. By the time we got out of the test Bryan's mom and Bryan got there. I was grateful not to be alone because what happened next really surprised me.
The nurse came in and said something about his appendix and said she heard names of surgerns being talked about but she mostly likely wasn't even supposed to tell us that. A few minutes later one of the ER dr.'s came in and said it is his appendix and it has ruptured. That's when I feel apart. It's bad enough to hear that news about one of your babies but to be 8+ months pregnant and hear that is hard core. I'm a emotional mess without news like that. He also said there is a abscess on it too. Not a fun sounding word. It's a collection of puss- nice huh? The dr. said (and I don't remember his name) that they were calling the dr.'s on call and they were already on their way to do the surgery. I was a mess. I looked at my little boy laying on the bed and he was so tired and out of it he had no idea what was going on and he was just staring at me. He had no expression on his face. I thought about the poison that was filling his body and for who knows how long. I thought back to all the times in the last couple of days I had gotten after him about not walking and thinking he was being dramatic. I thought about me leaving him in my room alone to watch tv for awhile while I got other stuff done and how I should have been holding him and believing him that he was really in a lot of pain. He counts on me to keep him safe and take care of him and I didn't do that. I was a mess. I also knew that a ruptured appendix could be fatal and I was sick thinking about loosing my sweet little boy. I kept praying to God to not take my boy from me because I needed him. This really sweet and kind nurse that had been helping me for the few hours in the ER put her hand on my shoulder and gave me a box of tissues. Now I wasn't making a scene or anything but I couldn't do anything to stop the tears and believe me I tried. I didn't want to scare Ty but he seemed oblivious to anything that was going on. I figured it was his appendix after awhile but though it had only been a day so it has to be just inflamed. I calmed myself down enough to start filling out paper work for the surgery. I HATE how stuff is asked like "do you have a living will or power of attorney?" or organ donation. Like I want to think about that. They got all the dr.'s to the hospital within a hour or so. In that time my father in law got there. My kind neighbors came over to sit at the house so Blake wasn't here alone asleep and it was at least 10 pm by this point. In my religion we believe that God can give men power from him to bless and help people. Men who are worthy of it I should say and we call it giving a blessing. It's a lot like saying a special prayer for someone. My father in law had to give it because Bryan couldn't get the words out with all of the emotion he was feeling and who could blame him? The blessing talked about how he would recover from this and the surgery would go well. It said some other things too but you get the idea. I felt the first feeling of a little bit of peace hearing those words that my baby (even though he is almost 5 I still call him my baby) would make it out of this ok in the end.
I really felt like God was looking out for us and he was in control. I was nervous and worried but I had this feeling of peace about it all too. I just wanted them to pull that dang thing out and get him cleaned up. He had a awesome surgeon named Dr. Weiss who a lot of nurses told us was really good. He did a surgery of Bryan's, my mother in law, my father in law and some other family as well so that made me feel really good to know he was in great hands. The anesthesiologist was a friend of Bryan's family too so I felt really good about the team of people working on him.
Different dr.'s came in to talk to us about what was going to happen then Joel Robinson (the anesthesiologist) to have us walk back with Ty to surgery. We were giving him kisses goodbye and I could tell he still didn't understand what was going on even though we kind of told him. (it was around 11pm by now) We were walking away from him and he started to cry so Joel put a extra shot of morphine in his IV to relax him (I'm sure as much for Bryan and I as it was for Ty) so after like 30 seconds he relaxed and we waved goodbye to him. After we walked out the doors I fell apart again. I just felt so bad that I had been kind of mean to him all day for everything. I remember that I just kept saying "I just didn't know Bryan". We stood there and hugged each other for awhile and finally went upstairs to where his room would be. The actual surgery took a little over a hour and Dr. Weiss called me personally on the phone in the room to tell me how everything went. He said there wasn't as much puss as they thought would be in there and his body had built this defense kind of around that area so it didn't spread too much though his body. He said they got all they could see but he would be on a antibiotic for a few days. When they brought him up he wasn't crying or anything (after getting his tonsils out he was balling) and when he saw Bryan he told him "I'm really tough dad." I'm sure the nurses and dr's had been telling him that. Joel Robinson told us as he was coming out of surgery he was talking up a storm about swimming lessons and things like that. I'm sure it was the meds talking but made us feel good anyway. He pretty much slept until noon the next day. He only woke up a couple of times while they gave him medicine and checked him out. He looked terrible. His oxygen levels kept dropping (common when they are coming out of surgery like that and while they sleep) so his monitors kept going off. Try sleeping by your kid when a monitor goes off saying they aren't getting enough to breath. I felt like I was going to have a heart attack every time I heard them. So they finally put some oxygen in his nose to help him out. It was so sad to see him like that. It was one of those nights where you couldn't sleep and you keep looking at the clock wishing it was morning. Every time he woke I went to get Bryan in the other room (he couldn't sleep at all) where he was watching TV so he wouldn't bother Ty.
Ty would ask to see him with this sad little voice because the breathing tube they put down this throat during surgery hurt his throat. Bryan went home for a minute the next morning to shower and pick up a couple of things for Ty like his bunny and a blanket and came back up to the hospital. Around noon I told TY we would give him a ride around in a wheel chair whenever he felt like it and he said he wanted to go now. It was the first sign of my boy being back.
A lot happened over the next 3 days we were in the hospital but we are home now and doing good. Ty is up moving around more and eating more and more everyday. He still looks really pale and had a hard time getting around but he improves everyday.
Bryan and I can't thank our
friends and family enough for the
enormous outpouring of love and support. It moves me to tears to think about how kind and thoughtful people have been- specially from our friends in our ward and our neighbors. I just can't express enough how amazed I am
at the generosity and kindness of people. There is a lot more I can say about this whole experience but I'm already really lengthy about typing this already. I am just to grateful to God for his blessings for helping us though such a scary time and for good dr.'s and nurses for their help. I know God blessed my son and I know all the prayers people offered in behalf of him have helped him recover so quickly.
