We are home now, released Friday the 23 of October. Since then I have been recovering and cleaning the house I missed SO much. We have lots of sad and good pictures to remember this not so fun experience, but we are so very grateful for the outcome of our sweet little girl being well.
Emily got sick on a Sunday and threw up all morning. The next day began with fevers of 103 and pain in her stomach. I figured it was just the flu and hunkered down to wait it out. However, the next day the fevers were gone, but the pain had intensified. I thought it was a bladder infection like the one she had had 9 months before so I took her into the doctor. They tested her urine and found that wasn't the problem and then the light bulb went on that it could be her appendix. We got an ultra sound that showed what we thought. I had to call Robert from work and also call grandma to come get Lindsey and off to the ER at Primary Children's hospital. After some tests and talks with the surgeon- who is amazing by the way!- they said they were pretty sure it had already ruptured by her symptoms. They took her up to surgery right away and our poor little girl was already asleep from all of the pain. Surgery went well, but they told us they have 5 levels of rupture and she was level 5.
Her pre-surgery kitty from the hospital that she named Lucy. And her post surgery animal she named Cassie. She asked us to help her with a name for her kitty and we suggested lovely names like "Dumpling" or "Sprinkles" to which she replied "Those aren't names those are food." So Lucy it is. These are post-surgery pictures. She did really well after surgery.
Sitting up to watch a movie with her smiley face bandage for her IV that pumped fluids and antibiotics into her. Then things took a bad turn. They gave her a day of fluids only and then upgraded her to foods. That was when she started vomiting really bad smelling bile. Dark green nasty stuff. Unfortunately the first time it happened the nurse didn't record it. When it happened again that night they told me they would need to put an NG tube in her nose and to her stomach to pump out the fluid- doing this with NO sedation. I was terrified! It was late, I was alone and had to be outside of the room hearing the nurses hold her down while the shoved a tube down her nose and throat. I cried for a long time and called Robert on the phone sobbing. It was heart breaking. At 3:00 in the morning she told me she had ripped it out during her sleep and they had to come do it again. She didn't take it out a second time.
Emily spent a week looking like this. She couldn't eat or drink, didn't have the energy to play and was very miserable. She spent a good part of the day with a bucket to her face so she could throw up if she needed to. Even though she had this horrible tube down her throat it was still important that she get up and walk 4 times a day and do her breathing exercises every hour. She hated doing it, but she did it. She kept herself from getting pneumonia because of her efforts. We would have to unhook her drain and take a bucket on our walks so she could puke. Until one of our favorite nurses decided to put the end of it in a baby diaper to drain so she wouldn't be sick to her stomach. It worked wonders.
After a week of misery she was able to play some. She got a CT scan which she said was very scary and they gave her a glass doll because she was so brave. The scan was to check for abscess infections. It showed none. Here she is coloring her hospital doll.
Primary Children's is an AMAZING hospital! Every day they have an activity for the kids to do, they have a playroom with closets of toys, movies, therapy dogs and cats to visit sick kids, books to borrow and some to take home, volunteers to come and read to them, etc. etc. We were so amazed by them and are so grateful to all those that helped. We are wanting to donate to The Festival of Trees this year that helps the many kids that need it. So many children there stay for months at a time for various problems including cancer.
This is the wonderfully horrible pull out bed that I slept on 5 days a week and Robert slept on for the weekends. It was terrible!!
Emily finally got that horrible NG tube out. She was so happy to be rid of it she told them she would pull it out herself and she did! Here she is playing with playdough and a toy pretzel.
The many toys she got from the hospital. This is a small portion. There was so much more.
Emily and the only therapy cat named Bullet. This cat is insured for 1 million dollars.
Robert had his 30th birthday on the 21 of October while Emily was still in the hospital. Emily wanted so much to celebrate his birthday still. She loves birthdays no matter who is having it. So we spent the day making a card for her Daddy. She did a great job too.
Before his birthday she started spiking a fever of 104 so off to the CT she went. She has decided that tubes are no good by this time. She had the tube in her nose, the tube in her bottom for the last CT and she has a tube in her arm for her antibiotics. They put a PICC line to her heart so they could give her more food sustaining IVs so she wouldn't loose weight. The second CT showed and abscess on one side so she went down to radiology to get it drained under sedation. Turns out the radiologist was an old Bishop at the University of Utah. Emily was hilarious under the sedation. Laughing and giggling and asking people if they had any glasses for her. Then they kicked me out to put the tube in to drain the abscess. So another lovely tube.
Sleepy Emily.
Emily had 3 Aunts come and stay with her for a couple hours so Robert and I could do something for his birthday and actually see each other since we hadn't done that in so many days. We just traded off hospital stays and going to spend time with Lindsey who was with her grandma all this time. We were so grateful she loves and knows her grandma so well so that she was okay to be with her. We don't know what we would have done without her grandparents help.
Emily is the nurse putting an IV in for her hospital doll with the child life therapist at the hospital. I called them up to give her some attention because for the first week when she was so sick Emily hardly talked at all.
Cute nurse Emily!
Painting her birdhouse. They decided to pull Emily from her antibiotics and IV fluids to see what would happen. We were being trained to have her go home with a PICC line and a home care nurse to give her daily antibiotics. Well after pulling her off of them a fever began. It got to 101 and then was gone for 2 days. They pulled out her drain and took her PICC line out. She was eating and keeping it down so they sent us home.
After 17 days in the hospital we felt like we missed out on beautiful fall. We went to Robert's parents house to pick up Lindsey and Emily was so happy to be outside she wanted to play in a pile of grandma's leaves.
Lindsey missed being home, her own bed and her family.
It has been a hard few weeks and makes us appreciate being in our own home so much. Emily has lost about 8-10 lbs and we are working to build her strength back up. We aren't going out much in the hopes to avoid any other illnesses. I don't think our little Emily could handle it right now. We are grateful to God that she is okay.
Emily got sick on a Sunday and threw up all morning. The next day began with fevers of 103 and pain in her stomach. I figured it was just the flu and hunkered down to wait it out. However, the next day the fevers were gone, but the pain had intensified. I thought it was a bladder infection like the one she had had 9 months before so I took her into the doctor. They tested her urine and found that wasn't the problem and then the light bulb went on that it could be her appendix. We got an ultra sound that showed what we thought. I had to call Robert from work and also call grandma to come get Lindsey and off to the ER at Primary Children's hospital. After some tests and talks with the surgeon- who is amazing by the way!- they said they were pretty sure it had already ruptured by her symptoms. They took her up to surgery right away and our poor little girl was already asleep from all of the pain. Surgery went well, but they told us they have 5 levels of rupture and she was level 5.
Her pre-surgery kitty from the hospital that she named Lucy. And her post surgery animal she named Cassie. She asked us to help her with a name for her kitty and we suggested lovely names like "Dumpling" or "Sprinkles" to which she replied "Those aren't names those are food." So Lucy it is. These are post-surgery pictures. She did really well after surgery.
Sitting up to watch a movie with her smiley face bandage for her IV that pumped fluids and antibiotics into her. Then things took a bad turn. They gave her a day of fluids only and then upgraded her to foods. That was when she started vomiting really bad smelling bile. Dark green nasty stuff. Unfortunately the first time it happened the nurse didn't record it. When it happened again that night they told me they would need to put an NG tube in her nose and to her stomach to pump out the fluid- doing this with NO sedation. I was terrified! It was late, I was alone and had to be outside of the room hearing the nurses hold her down while the shoved a tube down her nose and throat. I cried for a long time and called Robert on the phone sobbing. It was heart breaking. At 3:00 in the morning she told me she had ripped it out during her sleep and they had to come do it again. She didn't take it out a second time.
Emily spent a week looking like this. She couldn't eat or drink, didn't have the energy to play and was very miserable. She spent a good part of the day with a bucket to her face so she could throw up if she needed to. Even though she had this horrible tube down her throat it was still important that she get up and walk 4 times a day and do her breathing exercises every hour. She hated doing it, but she did it. She kept herself from getting pneumonia because of her efforts. We would have to unhook her drain and take a bucket on our walks so she could puke. Until one of our favorite nurses decided to put the end of it in a baby diaper to drain so she wouldn't be sick to her stomach. It worked wonders.
After a week of misery she was able to play some. She got a CT scan which she said was very scary and they gave her a glass doll because she was so brave. The scan was to check for abscess infections. It showed none. Here she is coloring her hospital doll.
Primary Children's is an AMAZING hospital! Every day they have an activity for the kids to do, they have a playroom with closets of toys, movies, therapy dogs and cats to visit sick kids, books to borrow and some to take home, volunteers to come and read to them, etc. etc. We were so amazed by them and are so grateful to all those that helped. We are wanting to donate to The Festival of Trees this year that helps the many kids that need it. So many children there stay for months at a time for various problems including cancer.
This is the wonderfully horrible pull out bed that I slept on 5 days a week and Robert slept on for the weekends. It was terrible!!
Emily finally got that horrible NG tube out. She was so happy to be rid of it she told them she would pull it out herself and she did! Here she is playing with playdough and a toy pretzel.
The many toys she got from the hospital. This is a small portion. There was so much more.
Emily and the only therapy cat named Bullet. This cat is insured for 1 million dollars.
Robert had his 30th birthday on the 21 of October while Emily was still in the hospital. Emily wanted so much to celebrate his birthday still. She loves birthdays no matter who is having it. So we spent the day making a card for her Daddy. She did a great job too.
Before his birthday she started spiking a fever of 104 so off to the CT she went. She has decided that tubes are no good by this time. She had the tube in her nose, the tube in her bottom for the last CT and she has a tube in her arm for her antibiotics. They put a PICC line to her heart so they could give her more food sustaining IVs so she wouldn't loose weight. The second CT showed and abscess on one side so she went down to radiology to get it drained under sedation. Turns out the radiologist was an old Bishop at the University of Utah. Emily was hilarious under the sedation. Laughing and giggling and asking people if they had any glasses for her. Then they kicked me out to put the tube in to drain the abscess. So another lovely tube.
Sleepy Emily.
Emily had 3 Aunts come and stay with her for a couple hours so Robert and I could do something for his birthday and actually see each other since we hadn't done that in so many days. We just traded off hospital stays and going to spend time with Lindsey who was with her grandma all this time. We were so grateful she loves and knows her grandma so well so that she was okay to be with her. We don't know what we would have done without her grandparents help.
Emily is the nurse putting an IV in for her hospital doll with the child life therapist at the hospital. I called them up to give her some attention because for the first week when she was so sick Emily hardly talked at all.
Cute nurse Emily!
Painting her birdhouse. They decided to pull Emily from her antibiotics and IV fluids to see what would happen. We were being trained to have her go home with a PICC line and a home care nurse to give her daily antibiotics. Well after pulling her off of them a fever began. It got to 101 and then was gone for 2 days. They pulled out her drain and took her PICC line out. She was eating and keeping it down so they sent us home.
After 17 days in the hospital we felt like we missed out on beautiful fall. We went to Robert's parents house to pick up Lindsey and Emily was so happy to be outside she wanted to play in a pile of grandma's leaves.
Lindsey missed being home, her own bed and her family.
It has been a hard few weeks and makes us appreciate being in our own home so much. Emily has lost about 8-10 lbs and we are working to build her strength back up. We aren't going out much in the hopes to avoid any other illnesses. I don't think our little Emily could handle it right now. We are grateful to God that she is okay.
