My Day Friday- A Personal Story {Intussusception}

It is My Day Friday and I am doing something that I don't usually do here on my craft blog.  I am sharing a personal story.  I have written this post out in my mind countless times this last week and every time it ends up with me crying.  We will see if I can make it through.  If you have followed my blog for a while than you know that I took a pretty long blogging break.  Blogging was going really well until I got pregnant with my third child, Mackay who we call Mack.

 I couldn't really do anything at all, least of all projects for my blog so it fell by the wayside.  In the later part of my pregnancy I started feeling better so I started to do a few more things on the blog.

Then Mack was born and things were a little sparse again.  Now we fast forward 6 months.  Get ready, this is long...

 Mack had his 6 month well baby check-up at the doctor.  Everything looked great.  He got shots and the rotavirus drops.   The next day,  I fed him and put him down for a nap.  Instead of falling asleep  though he just started screaming.  This was very unusual for him because he was the happiest baby.  He cried for one hour straight and then threw up.   Following that he threw up again.  Then he fell asleep.  I was so worried about him that I kept checking on him in his crib.  He was restless the whole time.  Then he threw up again.  When it comes to taking kids to the doctor, I like to be on the safe side and take them in just to make sure.  We were not sure if he had the stomach flu or was having a reaction to the vaccines.  Our pediatrician felt Mack’s abdomin.  No hard masses to alarm him.  We discussed the possibility of something called intussusception which had been linked to an earlier version of the rotavirus vaccine.  That vaccine had been pulled from the market in 2006 and the new vaccine was supposed to not have the same link.  He sent us home to give Mack pedialite for the next 4 hours.  Mack continued throwing up every few hours.  My husband I and stayed up all night long taking turns holding him making sure he was safe.  That morning he had his first diaper that had a streak of dark orangeish brown rust color.  I called the nurse immediately.  She didn’t think it was blood.  We kept watching Mack.  He kept throwing up.  He had 3 or 4 more diapers that had that rust colored diarrhea.  I called the nurse again and they still didn’t think it was blood. He was taking a red and an orange pedialite so they thought that may be the reason for the color. My mother came over and I showed her one of the diapers.   She was concerned that the rust color could actually be blood.   We called the after hours doctor and took the diaper with us.  The after hours doctor thought it was a virus of some kind.  Possibly giardia.  We had just come back from our cabin and so it was a possibility.  He tested the diaper and it was indeed blood.  He felt his abdomin and could not feel any hard masses either.  He sent us home to keep doing pedialite and to collect a stool sample.  The whole while Mack just kept throwing up non stop and he was not doing well at all.   We stayed up all night with him again.   In the morning he had a diaper that was only bright red moucousy blood. I called the doctor right away.  We headed to take Mack back in.   This was another new doctor because it was a Saturday morning.  I could barely explain things to him because I couldn't stop crying.   He felt Mack’s stomach and looked at the diaper.  He could feel a mass just under his belly button.  He told us that he thought Mack had intussusception. Intussusception is a really long name that basically means that his intestines were digesting themselves.  He wrote us an order to check Mack into the pediatric unit of the hospital.  From there everything happened very fast.  Everywhere we went, they were waiting for us.  The nurses got an IV into Mack first thing to get him some fluids.   Once the IV was in, we went down to radiology to get an ultrasound done.  From the ultrasound they could tell that Mack’s intestines had telescoped in on themselves.  The diagnosis of intussusception was correct.   From there we went straight to x-ray.  They laid little Mack on his side to take the pictures.  They were checking to see if there was any air around it which would be a sign that the bowel had perforated.  We had our fingers crossed that it had not.  Once that was done we awaited the radiologist’s word.  From the x-ray they could see that the bowel had not ruptured but it had telescoped in enough that it would require surgery.  The pediatric surgeon at the hospital was not there so we needed to head up to Primary Children’s Medical Center.   After having converced with the radiologist and seeing the urgency of the situation, the doctor indicated that we would need to life flight Mack up to Primary Children’s.  

 I was beyond anxious for my little man at this point.  There was not room in the life flight helicopter for my husband or I to go with Mack.  We wanted to make sure that someone was there when he arrived at Primary Children’s so my husband left the hospital immediately to drive up.  I stayed with Mack until the Life Flight people came.   They strapped him into a little gurney.  My heart was in pieces as I stood at the end of the hall and watched them wheel my baby away.  I knew Mack had 4 life flight technitions with him to help if there was a problem, but he didn't have his momma there to hold him and tell him that everything was going to be okay.  My dad met me at the hospital and drove me to Primary Children’s.  When Mack arrived at Primary Children's,  they took him to immediately to Radiology again.  There they felt his abdomen   It was very hard.  Surgery was our best option.  The surgeon said that if he got in and unwound the intestines and found that they were still viable then that would be the end and it would only take about 30 minutes.  If the intestines weren’t viable still then he would need to remove the dead parts and reattach them.   So my sweet little baby boy went in to surgery and we waited.  My dad and my husband gave me a blessing.   It was at this time sitting in the surgical waiting room that I had one of the most profound spiritual experiences that I have ever had.  I could literally feel warmth around my shoulders.  The feeling of The Comforter is often described as a warm blanket or a hug.  That description couldn't be more accurate.  I could feel my Heavenly Father's love for me and for my son and I could feel all the prayers of so many being given on my behalf.   The time went by.  I knew if we saw the surgeon by 7:00 pm that things would have gone really well.  7:00 passed and there was no surgeon.  I knew he would be alright though.  At 7:30pm the surgeon came in.  The surgery went well.  The surgeon found that there were spots on intestines that were dead.  They had been telescoped in for long enough that the blood flow had been cut off to the intestines.  The surgeon removed 5 inches of the lower intestines, the ileocecal valve, the appendix and a small portion of the large intestines.  He then reattached the large intestines to the small intestines.  He said that Mack should have no problems in the futures with maybe only needing some vitamin b12. 

We went to see Mack in the recovery room.  I was so relieved to see my sweet little boy.   He had been through so much but he never gave up.  He just kept fighting.   The next few days in the hospital were rough.  Mack was in pain.

The morphine syringes in his IV weren’t enough to help with the pain.  He also had ibuprofin and Tylenol.  It still wasn’t enough.  After a really bad first night where my husband and I took turns holding him again, they decided to put him on a morphine drip to stay on top of the pain.  That seemed to work.

My happy little man was returning.  On Wednesday morning we got the all clear to go home.  It took a few more days for Mack to start feeling better.  His little voice was hoarse for a while but he started smiling again.  Our little Miracle Mack.  My husband said he had his “Man Day”.  He rode in a helicopter and got a cool scar all in one day.  Little trooper.   

Mighty Mack and I Easter 2013

So now you know why I was missing in action.  I apologize if you sent me an email or left a comment and you never heard back from me.  I am excited though to be creating things again and sharing them with all of you!