Sick Baby and a 4 am Ride

Hello, loyal followers!  Sorry for the long gap in posts.  It's been a rough week in Elliott's World.  As I mentioned in my last post, Elliott has been fussy recently.  On Friday night, he was up crying every hour.  Thinking we had another ear infection on our hands, we went to the doctor on Saturday morning.  His ears were clear but, in talking to the doctor, I realized that he had been running a fever on and off for almost a week.  The doctor said to keep an eye on him, call if the fever came back over the weekend, and come in on Monday if he still had a fever.  His fever came back on Sunday so I talked to the on-call physician several times that day.  We decided that he would need to go in on Monday for more tests (viral fevers typically last 5-7 days, fevers lasting longer than that typically indicate something else).  

Well, things took a turn that night.  Elliott woke up at 4 am and felt really warm.  I took his temperature and nearly had a heart attack.  He had a fever of 104.8.  I took it again in case there was an error and it said 105.5.  I called the doctor and he said Elliott needed to be seen right away and that we should go to the hospital for that. As I quickly gathered up our things, I called my parents to let them know what was going on.  They immediately said they would meet us there.  I ended up picking my mother up on my way by their house and my dad followed a short while later.  

By the time we got to the hospital, Elliott's temperature was down to 100.8.  Because of his fever over the past week, they did urine and blood testing.  I was comforted knowing he would not remember that process but I certainly will.  He also got antibiotics by IV to cover him in case the fever was due to a bacterial infection (a UTI was high on the list of possibilities).  We stayed there for a few hours but left without any answers.  That afternoon, his fever spiked again to 104.7.  I was calm for the 4 am fever spike but freaked out this time.  Ted and my dad were steady rocks and cooled Elliott down with cold compresses and a cool bath while I called the doctor.  The doctor said it wasn't entirely unexpected and had us give regular doses of tylenol and motrin to keep the fever from coming back.

The BIG highlight of the day was when Jesse called literally as we were leaving the hospital.  He had been gone for three weeks and called to say he was coming home on Tuesday.  Big hooray!! 

Elliott has been on the mend since our scary Monday.  The doctors don't know what caused it and there are still some pending lab results.  He seemed to be back to near 100% happy boy today.  We are thrilled to have Jesse home.  I knew it would be hard when Jesse was gone but it's certainly a challenge.  Elliott has been sick.  Work has been crazy.  We're just getting by but we made it!!  Jesse takes such wonderful care of Elliott and me.  Life has been wonderfully easy, breezy since Jesse came home.  And I've slept!! 

Okay . . . almost done with my monologue.  My family has been absolutely amazing for the past three weeks and particularly great on Monday.  My parents have watched Elliott many, many times and always with a big smile when I ask.  Ted babysat while Holly and I hosted a bridal shower for Jen.  Holly keeps me sane and even held a fussy Elliott at 3 am when we spent the night at her house last weekend.  When Elliott and I headed for the hospital at 4 am, my whole family met us at the hospital.  I can't thank them enough for their love and support!

On to the pictures!

Sick little boy.  They left an IV in his arm in case they needed more blood or had to administer any medication.  It was so sad.



At the end of our stay when he was in good spirits.  The nice hospital cleaning staff brought more chairs in for our big family support system.

Happy boy getting fed dinner by Daddy last night.

Mmmm.  Fingers.  Yum.