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June 22, 2008

Nika's Hospital Stay

So I haven't posted in a while because of the chaos in our life lately. With it being summer I find I am never really home. I am always trying to find things to do with the kids like swimming, or going to free movies sponsored at our local movie theater. But it is Sunday now and I feel like I can catch up on our latest happenings.
So those of you who know us well know that our 3 year old Nika has Asthma, and we have known about it since she was two. We deal with twice a day treatments through her nebulizer.

She usually falls asleep during her night treatment.
She also takes a daily allergy pill to hold off possible asthma triggers.
However even with all the preventatives there are days where she suffers an attack. We have albuterol on hand to deal with these situations.
Tuesday night the 10th, Nika was sounding a little squeaky. She literally will sound like a bird has taken up roost in her throat. We noticed and gave her a treatment before she went to bed.
She has lived with this long enough to know when she needs what she calls her "breathing medicine." So around 4 in the morning she came and woke me up sounding worse and asking for another treatment.
We have her machine hooked up in the living room so most times this occurs she will just grab her pillow and end up sleeping on the couch once her treatment is done. This time was no different. She also tends to strip off her pj's ( I think because in her mind this allows for easier breathing) When Ben got up in the morning of the 11th for work she was agitated and wanting another breathing treatment. We both could see that even with the albuterol she was still struggling.
I have never had to take her to the ER before for an attack. We have an overnight urgent pediatric care facility that I usually use but they are not open during the day and her doctors wouldn't open for another hour. She was retracting pretty badly. (meaning: when you look at her you can see her skin sucking in between and under her ribs, and using her auxiliary muscles, like her belly to breathe.)
We have dealt with this before but this time she was very anxious and upset. I drove her to the ER and they let us in immediately. Her O Sat. (oxygen saturation) wasn't to bad at that point because she had just had a treatment. It was around 90%. She received a one hour continuous zopinex treatment. (Zopinex is like albuterol with less of the side effects, like increased heart rate.) A bright side to going to this ER was that a member of our ward was her nurse and he made me feel a little more calm than I normally would have been I think.
She seemed OK during the treatment and for a short time after. They took chest X-rays and after an hour had gone by she was agitated and uncomfortable again. When respiratory got in they took one look at her and knew she was in need of another treatment. This time they gave her a mixture of albuterol and atrovent. She had been so wound up and breathing so hard that this treatment and the relief it brought, sent her right to sleep. She slept for another half hour or so and when the nurse came in to check her O sats they were hovering between 77 and 80% which is hypoxic (that's a big word for deficient in oxygen).
At this point since she had had two treatments and was worsening they decided she needed to be put on oxygen and admitted. The hospital I was at (while wonderful) does not have a pediatric unit so we got to have one more breathing treatment and then had a lovely ride in the ambulance to a nearby hospital. Usually we go to Phoenix Children's Hospital (the hospital where 1 month old Liam had a two day stay)but they had no beds so we went to Banner Thunderbird.
Nika was very tired and cranky at this point and even though Daddy came with our friend Brandon to give her a blessing, she still wasn't very happy. Even a visit from a therapy dog named Molly didn't cheer her up. That afternoon they decided that instead of an oxygen mask (which makes it hard to eat and drink) they would give her a oxygen nasal tube. It was quite disturbing for me because even though the tube barely goes into her nose she absolutely did not want it on.

Myself and another nurse pulled the bed sheet up to her neck and held her down while a 2nd nurse placed the nasal tube on and then taped to her cheeks. She was furious (especially with me) and thrashed and tried to kick. It was like she was possessed!
For the next little bit I had to make sure she didn't reach up and rip off the tube. She eventually calmed down but every five or ten minutes she would scream "take it off of me!"
That night was a hard one for both of us.
Even looking at this picture now makes me start tearing up. All I wanted to do was help her and it was hard that she was so angry with me.
A little bit happier
Because of a higher O sat... and also a lower heart rate..
By the next morning she had pretty much forgotten the nasal tube was in. She was still breathing rapidly (even with breathing treatments every two hours and a liquid steroid - prednisolone)but was feeling better.
Surprisingly that morning the hospital was opening a new child's outdoor area for the pediatric patients. So Nika was one of three patients to be the first kids to use the facility. They had balloons, bubbles, a lot of hospital higher up ands a bunch of therapy dogs on hand.
With her portable oxygen tank and a fast male orderly she managed to play on everything!And another car...

Pausing off the car long enough for a pet with Suzie...this is a scan of a Polaroid (sorry for the quality)
All the therapy dogs had these baseball like cards with stats on the back. If a child petted the dog then they got to keep a card. Very cute!
A close and personal visit from Allie
Some more playing
Getting a hand painting (since her cheeks were occupied) by Pinkie the clown. Want to guess what her favorite color is?
Our favorite therapy dog Dakota
Playing with the bubble machine...
The orderly did an awesome job keeping up with a running, jumping 3 year old with a nasal tube! She has fun and makes due even with low oxygen...that is my trooper! She is determined to have fun, the stubborn little dutch girl!
We found a fun room on the pediatric floor that was a toy room for the kids. Full of donated toys, books, and crafts the room was open during the day and kids could take toys back to their rooms or play there. It was a nice escape for Nika and she seemed to be one of the only kids well enough to play in the toy room. We spent most of Thursday there. I should mention that they had a full children's movie list as well and you could ask your nurse to check out movies. So that was also helpful.
One of the hard parts of our ER visit was that Nika was totally bored. They had a TV but no remotes so I couldn't even turn on PBS for her. (Apparently they had all been stolen and the TV was no longer being built so the manufacturer did not have the ability to send new remotes.)
Also the hospital has a program called Andrea's closet (named after a little girl who died of Leukemia.) Pediatric patients are offered a choice of a toy from the closet as a reward for their bravery. We got a little stuffed Mickey Mouse. I joked that we could tell people that we went to Disneyland instead of the hospital
Anyhow we ended up staying until Friday at which point I let everyone who came into the room know that we were ready to go home. Nika was at a point where I felt comfortable treating her at home and though her oxygen was still in the low 90's I pointed out the fact that her baseline was bound to be lower than a normal healthy child. At this point she was bouncing all over her room, the hallways and the toy room. In other words back to her normal little self.
Considering everything it was a great hospital, we had a private comfortable room and I found that I actually could sleep at night there. But still I was ready to go home.
So Friday afternoon after one last dog visit. This time from Ashley we managed to get away with prescriptions in hand to fill and a happy family waiting for me.
I should note that Ben, Jed and the kids had cleaned the house big time for us! If not for our ward family and Jed we would have been a lot worse off as far as taking care of the other three kiddo's so I am grateful to them!
Thanks everyone for your love and support. We are home and hopefully we won't have any more hospitalizations!
Next step is a blood allergy test for Nika.

11 comments:

Klare said...

I am so sorry that Nika, and the rest of you, had to go through that. But I am very happy that she is doing better and you guys are home! We love and miss you guys!!!!!

Andersons said...

My heart goes out to poor little Nika. No child should have to go through that! I'm glad the hospital made is as fun as possible, though. You are such a trooper of a mom! I would have had 25 breakdowns by the time the whole ordeal was over. You're my hero!

redstarmama said...

Aaarrgh, Esther! This is such a bummer, and I am so impressed with your little warrior! I HATE asthma and what it does to Declan, and his is nothing like Nika's. It sounds like a huge blessing that you had to go to the hospital you went to. I'm glad you're back home to a clean and easier-breathing house.

Michelle said...

AWW! That pic of her crying made me tear up! :(
I am sorry you guys have had such an ordeal! You and Nika are both such troopers! Glad you are both home and she is doing much better. She is one tough cookie.
Love and miss you all!

Davianne said...

Poor little things! All the rest of you too! I'm so glad you had the help you needed and that you went to such a nice kid-friendly hospital. Glad you are both home and doing better now.

Camille said...

I too teared up over this post, and especially the picture of her crying!! Poor little thing!! I am so glad you are both home and things are better now!!Love and miss you all!!!

McB's said...

Man, mommy rocks!! When Kassidy went in for RSV her oxygen levels were at 80% and I was freaking out and crying. Hats off to you for hanging in there with her and being so brave. She is brave also and it breaks my heart when we have to do something for our kids (well "kid" for me) that seems so terrible for them but they need to have it done and you just want their hurt and scared to go away! I'm so glad you are home now and hopefully you stay away from there :)

Ashley said...

It really makes me want to cry to hear what she had to go through.

You are so lucky to have such a good hospital, a husband, and friends.

Sarah said...

Glad that you guys made it home! I was wondering what happened when I got your email saying she was home. I'm so glad that she's doing better. We miss our Sunday races too. :(

Unknown said...

I wanted to cry just reading that. She is so brave!! Our prayers our with her. I'm so sorry you guys had to go through that. It looks like she sure made the best of it though. What a sweetie.

Jodi said...

Yikes! So glad she's feeling better now! Poor girl, I feel even worse for her now that I've seen the pictures...