Sunday night Clara went to bed not feeling well. By midnight she was at my bedside with a fever and a barky cough. I tucked her in next to me thinking it must be the croup (we have had it a few times so I am pretty confident of the symptoms). I few times in the night when she had coughing spells the strider was bad enough I woke Josh, had her cuddled in a blanky to go outside and breathe cold air, she did settle down. In the morning I got her an appointment with my pediatrician. This was the fifth appointment I've had with the kids in the past few weeks and I really didn't want to go day before delivery but I felt it was for the best. (miracle #1).
9:00 am Josh takes kids to the airport to pick up Aunt Becky (planned arrival for help for my planned induced delivery on Tuesday)
I take Clara in to the Pediatrician. They give her a breathing treatment in the office, diagnosis was croup, just as Dr. H is leaving the room I mention that Clara is holding her spit in her mouth not wanting to swallow. She pauses and just to be safe rule out a dangerous infection asks us to head over to a hospital in Riverton for an x-ray.
10:30am We're all back home planning all the last minute things to get done before the baby...pack, shop, make kids schedule, etc. Call comes in from Dr Hornyik, she doesn't like the x-ray and says I need to take her up to Primary Children's Emergency for more evaluation with specialists, she mentioned that she had already called and they would be expecting us. (Even with that warning I didn't think anything more than some consultations a prescription and head back home. I give quick good byes and warn Becky this may take a few hours due to traffic and wait time.)
1:00pm-2pm We are settled into an ER room. I told the events of the night and day about 5x to different doctors and nurses. They bring in oxygen and intabation supplies and tell me to keep her calm and call immediately for any change in breathing. The xray shows a constricted airway probably caused by an infection and all agree she will need surgery to have in scoped, cleared, and tested. I am trying to be calm but I'm hearing words like intensive care, intabate, put on ventilators, all very common on children this age with type of surgery in the airway. As a side note: I start having real contractions pretty consistently.
3pm-5pm Liss and Mark pick up mom from the airport. To think we were joking about all the help I was going to have for this baby, just another miracle of being watched over. Mom starts timing my contractions about 3 mins apart. Josh gets to the hospital and he and Mark are able to give blessings to Clara and I. Clara and I had been in the room for hours no food or drink, she was this sweet, weak cuddle bug who sat on my lap and didn't let me leave her to even use the potty. Dr's are worried about my consistent contractions and make arrangements for me to be checked at the U hospital.
I head over to the U of U hospital (somewhat attached). I show having regular contractions 2-4 minutes apart but when they checked me I hadn't really dilated. They let me go and wanted to check me again in an hour or so. I was back just in time to take Clara up to surgery.
The doctors talked us through the procedure and gave us a very likely outcome of a child her age needing to be intabated due to have the aggravation of the instruments. (Which meant intensive care for a week and a week more in the hospital). Josh and I walked her to the yellow line and hesitantly handed her in the arms of an amazing nurse. (Another little miracle to have Clara not upset to be handed into the arms of a stranger!) We sat in the waiting room with a few other families eagerly waiting for news. Dr. G came to the waiting room. She was officially diagnosed with bacterial tracheatis. She did great and wasn't intabated. He showed pictures of how closed her airway was, SCARY! Josh was in the room when one of the doctors described the procedure to other doctors and said that he has only seen about four cases like this (in his long career) and described what was pulled out as thick bubble gum well over a foot long. The other doctors seemed to think it was really cool! "No way, really?"
This is where I hear everything else second hand because I am at another hospital giving birth to baby Ben. I was comforted knowing she was never alone Josh, Liss, Grandmas (Peg, and Pat), and Becky worked round the clock. Josh hopped back and forth between hospitals, Liss and Gma Pat with Clara, Beck with Noah and Rowan at home, and Gma Peg where ever duty called.
Clara was then placed in the Pediatric ICU where she recovered for days, NO FOOD for days, needed to stay calm during all the prodding to not aggravate her small airway (or she'd need to be there much longer). I f you know are little girl is prone to meltdowns at least once a day so this seemed like the impossible. Yet another miracle. The thought of her in the hospital for 2wks seemed unbearable. However, she did amazing. She didn't speak a lot the first few days and would just whisper out, "I'm hungry...can I have food?"
What an experience! At the time it, with all the unknowns, it was pretty traumatic. With each day it felt as if we had the best case scenarios work out for this difficult situation. We both eventually got home and got to share what our different "hostable" was like. I brought home a darling baby boy, Clara brought home bags of special blankies and toys from the hospital (and aunt). Nurses have sent cards since she was home. Primary Children's Hospital is a very special place. Clara had some very help watching over her. I definitely felt my prayers were answered.
