Tucker's First Thanksgiving...what an adventure!

Here is Tucker’s first Thanksgiving and adventure we will never forget. But forever be thankful for our family and friends praying, the doctors and nurses and our sweet boys strength.

Tucker started to not feel well on Tuesday. He was sleepy and fussy. If you know Tucker you know that the child never is fussy and is always laughing and smiling. We thought it might be teeth or the fact that he was still getting over an ear infection in the right ear and croup. He was on day 7 of his antibiotic, so we thought that wasn’t really the problem.

Tuesday evening we went to my mom’s for Thanksgiving dinner. Tucker was very fussy and not himself. He didn’t want to eat his solids (which is very unusual…our boy loves to eat!) We gave him a bath early and he went to sleep at 5pm at my mom’s. He woke up at 8:30pm and was super hot. We gave him some Advil and a bottle and headed back to the Mr’s parents house. When we got home we took his temperature and it was 104.8. Of course we started to really worry about our little guy. We called the nurse hotline for our pediatrician and talked to the nurse. I called L(she is basically my sister and she is an RN) and she told me to just watch him and give both Advil and Tylenol  at the same time. We gave him a cool bath and put cold cloths on him. We kept him up until the fever came down some. The fever went down to 102 by 11pm. We put him down in just a onesie and then woke him up at 1:30am for more meds and to check his temp. His temp was 101.6. I just prayed over him and asked God to break the fever and for him to sleep well. He woke up again at 4:30am…he nursed and then went back to bed for another hour.

6am on Wednesday Tucker and the Mr. went downstairs to play. He played like normal and ate a good amount of his cereal. He was acting pretty normal. Then he went down for his morning nap about 8:30am and slept until about 10:15am. We got dressed and went and took our Christmas photos. Tucker was sleepy  but not too fussy. After pictures we went home and the Mr. gave him some Advil and put him down for a nap. When he woke up from his nap about an hour and half later he was very fussy. He then had diarrhea. I tried to feed him some yogurt for lunch, but he didn’t want it. Then we thought we could distract him by taking him on a golf cart ride because he loves to be outside. While we were getting ready for the ride he started to throw up. This is when we decided to take him to urgent care. Since we were away from home we couldn’t take him to his pediatrician. We went to an urgent care in PTC. The doctor told us that he just had a fever and he would be okay. He checked his ears and throat; he said they were fine and that he would be okay. He then proceeded to say, if he’s not acting himself then you  should be concerned. Well, he wasn’t acting like himself and I was VERY concerned. Needless to say I was VERY upset when leaving the urgent care. I KNEW that there was something wrong with my sweet boy. I cried and cried because I felt like no one was taking this seriously. The Mr. and our family was but no doctor or nurse was. We called his pediatrician office and talked to the head nurse. She was like the stomach bug is going around and that’s probably what it was. I still wasn’t satisfied. He was so sad looking and just would whimper and sleep in and out.  So, we went back to the Mr’s parent’s house. We just rocked and watched Elmo to try to keep him happy. I went to change his diaper and it was filled with blood. I knew at that moment that this was something serious. We immediately got in the car and went to Fayette Piedmont.

On our way to Fayette Piedmont I prayed over my sweet boy that the doctors would find out very quickly what was wrong.  We arrived at Fayette Piedmont about 3pm. We didn’t have to wait long to get back in a triage room. The nurses were quick to get in our information in and the ER doctor came in and decided that this was serious but he wanted the Peds doctor to see him. The pediatrician would be coming in at 5pm. In the meantime they hooked Tucker up to an IV. He threw up during this, but the nurses were so quick and swift with him. We were put in a room not long after the IV was put in. Then Dr. Coles came in and within 5 minutes he knew exactly what was wrong with Tucker. He told us that Tucker had Intussusception. We had no idea what that big word meant when he told us. He explained it to us in very clear terms. Basically Tucker’s intestines had tangled up inside of each other and went into themselves like a telescope. This would explain the lack of appetite, throwing up, diarrhea and blood coming from his bottom. Dr. Coles then went on to tell us that Fayette Piedmont did not have the equipment needed to fully diagnose what he had. He told us that he worked at Scottish Rite too and that is where he would be sending us. He originally said that we would travel by ambulance. But after making some phone calls and checking Tucker out he decided that we needed to get there very quickly and a helicopter would be the quickest way. My heart dropped when he told us this, this meant it was very serious. The Mr. and I decided that I would go with Tucker and he would drive and meet us there. Within 15 minutes the helicopter was there for us.

Let’s just say the only highlight of all of this was the helicopter ride. It was AMAZING. Not the reason for the ride but the view and how quickly we got there was great. By this point it was about 6:15pm and it was dark and Atlanta was all lit up. We flew right over the airport, the GA dome and through downtown Atlanta. I sat up front with the pilot and the nurses in the back would talk thru the headset to me about what Tucker was doing. He slept most of the flight. We arrived at Scottish Rite about 6:35ish and were in a room in the ER by 6:45pm. The Mr. texted me that his arrival time was 7:10pm. He later told me that he was driving 95 mph. (Pretty scary.) As soon as we arrived at Scottish Rite we had a great nurse that checked us in and within 10 minutes an ER doctor was there to see Tucker. He ordered an ultra sound and X-ray for Tucker. The Mr. made it in time to go back with us for the X-ray and ultra sound. By 8pmish we had the X-rays and ultra sounds and were just waiting for the results. The doctor came in and told us that Tucker needed an air enema to reduce the Intussusception. This would be done while he was awake and we could be in the room for it. A radiologist performs this because there is an X-ray on while they put their air inside of him. By 10pm he had the procedure done. We were able to sit  in the room and watch on a screen the doctor perform the procedure. The nurses and doctor said that after he should have a lot of gas and go back to himself pretty quickly. We didn’t notice any gas and he was still very lethargic and fussy. We got into our room at about 10:45 and his fever was 104. The Mr’s mom came up and brought us some things we needed to stay the night. She helped us get settled in our room and then headed home.

We went through the night with him having a pretty high fever…between 102-104. We had the nurses test him for the flu because we thought that the procedure had worked so maybe it was something else. At 6:30 am they came in for another X-ray. But we hadn’t heard from the radiologist. By 9am Thursday morning we were asking a lot of questions. Dr. Linn was his doctor once we were put in a regular room and she was wonderful. The high fever really worried here.  She called the radiologist and wanted to know the results of the X-ray. While she was calling the ultra sound department came and got us very quickly. They started another ultra sound on him. This part was pretty horrible. He cried the whole time and the ultra sound took a good thirty minutes. The tech was great but we could tell it wasn’t good. Our nurse Patti had gone with us and on our way to the ultra sound room was prepping us for surgery and asking us all the questions that are required. The Mr. and I held on to Tucker tight and loved him while they were doing the ultra sound. After the ultra sound they had us sit in the hall and I could tell there was something really wrong because the nurses and techs were talking in the hall and they moved so we couldn’t see them. Then all of the sudden we were taken back into the room where they had done the air enema the night before. The Mr. looked at me and said, I didn’t know they were doing this again. It was all so quick. They told us that the air enema didn’t completely release the Intussusception. And they needed to do it again and if it didn’t work then it would be surgery. This is when I became really quiet and just kept praying. At this point Tucker was in so much pain and I knew it wasn’t going to be good for him to have it done again but it was needed. We were able to stay in the room and watch on the monitor. This time is worked. Immediately after he had horrible (but good) gas and his color in his face changed. We were so thankful that it worked the second time and there wasn’t a need for sugery. So by 11:45am we were back in our room and resting. Tucker hadn’t been able to eat at all and he was still restricted because they wanted his bowel to rest.

By 2:30pm he was allowed clear liquids. He only took about a 1/2 ounce at first. And we knew we would be staying another night at this point because Dr. Linn said she wanted him to have another X-ray in the morning to make sure it had completely worked. We just rested and tried to keep him comfy. My mom came and stayed most of the day with us. She was good company and held Tuck while I went to the bathroom, showered and pumped. He took a couple really good naps. By 6pm he was a little bit back to himself…he wanted to play a little bit. He drank a couple ounces of Enfalyte. The Mr’s parents and brother came up Thursday evening. They brought some Thanksgiving leftover and a big stuffed Elmo for T. He was happy to see them. It took us a while to get him calmed down to sleep, he had his first dirty diaper since the procedure and it was painful for him. After that he did sleep for about 6 hours.

By Friday morning he was taking the clear liquids just fine. Dr. Linn came in and said she didn’t think she was going to order another X-ray because he had improved. His fever finally went away. By 9am we were able to nurse again. This really helped. She said she wanted to check him again around lunch time. We took a few wagon rides around our floor and played in the big playroom on our floor. He was more like himself then he had been since Tuesday. We were happy with the improvements for sure. Dr. Linn came in about 1:45pm and was happy with his improvements and was going to get the discharge process going. The Mr. packed up so quick and took all of our stuff to the car. We couldn't wait to take our sweet boy home. And by 2:30 we were walking out to our car. Praise the Lord!

What an experience! But we are so thankful for the staff at Scottish Rite…the best nurses and doctors ever. We were happy with everyone that worked with Tucker. And a children’s hospital is the way to go…they know what they are doing with your baby. The whole place is just so kid friendly and the staff is so great.

The power of prayer is something else. The Mr. posted on Facebook and within minutes our phones were being blown up with people telling us that they were praying for us. We had family calling friends and friends calling friends. The prayers were just coming from everywhere and it was soo comforting that we had so many people praying for our baby boy. We are SO very thankful for everyone that prayed, texted, called, and sent emails. They all were so much appreciated.

We truly believe that all of the prayers helped in the process of God healing Tucker so quickly.

We love you all and thank you again!