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March 24, 2003
I lost count of what crisis number we were at this week.
Our house sits last on our street, to the right of it is a mini forest and then a retired golf course. Given that we're dead end, it's a decent place for the neighbourhood kids to hang out, so a couple weeks ago Remo brought a tractor home and made a big hill for them to toboggan on. When we started settling into a spring thaw, the hill started shrivelling up, leaving the kids more determined to get on it.
Tuesday after supper, the doorbell rang and a couple of rosy cheeked boys asked if Brandan and Remo could come out to play. Brandan was like a live wire, bouncing all over the place getting his stuff together. I have to smile everytime he talks about his "friends" given that he's years younger than all of them and he doesn't know any of their names or even which house they live in. Because the hill runs onto the street (houseless cul-de-sac), and the snow was half puddled, Remo had to shovel extra snow onto their path lest someone crash. Brandan got on his purple saucer but because he was so light, flew past the snow onto the street where his saucer came to a sharp stop and smash, he fell back onto the asphalt on his head. He started crying but stopped when Remo suggested they go in. Back up the hill he ran and for half an hour after, he tobogganed. When climbing back up the last time, Brandan fell on his chin, Remo called it quits.
In they came smelling of cold fresh excitement. Brandan was soaking wet from snow and sweat so I wanted to toss his stuff right in the wash. Just as Remo started telling me about his falls, I saw his hat and hood were covered in blood. A sickening feeling. We couldn't really tell where anything started so we put him under the shower. Fifteen minutes later we determined the cut was actually very small, and had pretty much stopped bleeding. We stuck a Caillou movie in, topped him off with a cold compress and wrapped up our night. Twice I went in to flick his cheek, he reacted and we wondered if this was what life with a boy would always be.
Brandan woke up the next morning, said his head hurt a bit but not so bad, off to our days we all went. Wednesday after supper it hit me I hadn't e-mailed Jen with my Survivor picks, so I brought the kids down to play and it seemed like Brandan was leaning off to a side. When I asked him how he was feeling, he said he felt dizzy and his head really hurt. Just by chance I called Dr. Kugelmass. She said if we brought him right away, she'd wait to see him.
She explained to us that head injuries can be cumulative, though this one was not Brandan's worst yet, that he was forever crashing and banging his head was not a good thing. She likened it to a certain extent to hockey player Eric Lindros, saying Brandan definitely had suffered head trauma, we should now for at least a week, ensure he stayed quiet, calm. No running, jumping, skating, nothing. She also said it was a good sign that he hadn't vomited, which would be indicative of something more serious. And kids should wear a helmet for EVERY activity. Both of us felt awful for not even thinking to put a helmet on him for tobogganing, he wears one for everything else, we were totally stupid.
We settled Brandan and Kaillan down for the night and flipped on the TV in time to catch the saddest news of the day. The war in Iraq had just begun. It was the first night I didn't fall asleep watching TV. Just after midnight, Brandan started shrieking upstairs about his head hurting. Then he started throwing up. Kaillan got up and ran around squealing "Babby pooked, Babby pooked" while we cleaned up. I called our medical help line and asked for their opinion, the nurse suggested a few things I could check, we should set the alarm for every hour to look for signs he was getting worse. We wondered if we should just go to the hospital all of us, wait till morning or call my aunt and ask her to come over? We didn't need the alarm because Brandan, sleeping in between us bolted up and yelled "I'm having a heart attack" a couple times. Now it makes me laugh to think about how scared I was, frantically feeling for his pulse to read his heart rate, and how seriously I took him when I told Remo "he thinks he's having a heart attack!" Remo said the next day he's four, how would he even have a clue what he was having?
When we got up the next morning, all of us were exhausted. Kaillan, who'd actually wrapped up her night at one o'clock in the morning, Brandan who felt wrecked and looked worse, and us, wiped out and worried. I had a 7:45 appointment with Dr. Bray and I asked him about Brandan. He said we should bring him right to the Children's hospital. Off we went.
Brandan was not himself. Very quiet, he refused to eat or drink anything and we got him a wheelchair because he seemed so weak all of a sudden. We were shipped off fairly quickly to our examining room and then we got the slowest resident in the world. So slow that I had to lean in to really concentrate on his questions. So thorough that he looked into Brandan's eyes for at least ten minutes, while his face was touching Brandan's. Maybe because I was tired or nervous, but everytime he moved closer and closer with that one eye looking so deeply, I had the potential to start giggling and never stop for the rest of my life. Our side had one doctor with three residents, one student and twelve patients and that's how the first four hours went by. The boy we were beside with appendicitis hadn't even had a consultation yet.
Brandan kept falling asleep which wasn't a good sign. He had a very hard time walking a straight line and when they ran something along the bottom of his feet, his toes on one foot were not reactive. They said he had to have a brain scan and I was actually great until we tried to get him to lie down for it. Trying to convince this little boy that he had to lay his raw aching head in that brace and be put into the machine, when everytime he leaned his head back a little he cringed and held his breath, was horrible. He begged us to let him go sideways, then they started talking about sedating him. His eyes, so scared, broke my heart.
We did the test and the technician said because it was lunch time, they wouldn't be able to start on his report til later. We said we understood but still thought please, can you do it now. We wanted to get something to eat but we weren't sure if Brandan was allowed. Back in emergency, the shy student said she didn't think so, but would check with a doctor. She stood with us til one would come along and listened to the answer from the next resident I asked. She simply shrugged. Our resident came by and said he had no idea, he didn't think he should eat, but he'd check. This was going on while an irate man was asking resident number two if his howling son could have a Tylenol. The resident asked the father if he thought his son needed one. How to make an irate man irater. That resident went to check with the doctor and managed to squeeze in her question before my three could. Now I understand entirely and appreciate indecisiveness when it comes to the well being of a patient, because God forbid a mistake happens, but everything was all backwards. Doctors were taking folders off the counter and the papers underneath of them would fall to the floor and be stepped over. It felt like I could jump up buck naked doing the chicken dance and they would just stare. The official doctor did say Brandan could drink and maybe nibble on something small and bland and wouldn't you know, after all that, Brandan wouldn't touch anything anyway.
Two more hours went by, the appendicitis boy was finally seen and immediately admitted and our results came back. Normal. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Brandan had or has a concussion and has to cut out physical activity for a week. He was in the midst of the world's worst migraine. Because he started spiking a fever, they also warned us that another virus had probably already landed. I was so grateful it didn't matter how long we waited. We are lucky to have such great facilities at that hospital and really, every single person we encountered was kind, from a sitcom maybe, but kind.
Remember how last entry I nitter-nattered about vanity and how in my old age I don't care? Well I changed my mind when I got on Dr. Bray's scale and it was a ten pound month and this time I was wearing shoes. I blame it half on bringing my lunch to work because ever since I started THAT I'm eating my lunch by eleven and then starving to death by my real lunch time, so I have another one and then at supper, I'm eating mine, finishing the kids and wrapping it all up with a treat every night. Then I started walking less because I was braxton hicking more. So what that everyone says ten pounds, good, you're pregnant. Nowhere in the book do you need 25,000 extra calories every day. From here on in I'm drumming to a more careful beat. I'm considering this a contract to myself, obviously no dieting, but I'll be careful. For the record, I've been at it all day and it's painful.
I asked Dr. Bray about my breach baby business and I swear he LOVED telling me I have a c-section to look forward to. Even joked I could get a tubal ligation at the same time so he could be finished with my challenges. My problem is that I only have a half uterus to work with and the baby hasn't got much space, never mind chance, to flip around. I'd rather gain a hundred pounds a month than have a cesarean and truthfully, I found the thought of it very depressing. Labour and delivery is the one thing in life I'm really good at, we're talking a couple hours, start to finish.
Could I ask a favour of any of you with c-section experience? Is it really that bad? While I love that it's easier on the baby, is it really a six week recovery? Even if I have the will to get up and at it faster? Here I had this plan to get in the best shape of my life after, should I be writing that off? And bigger than me and my ego, I worry about taking care of three kids when Remo's over his head in the summer. I'll be having the baby a month before Brandan starts school, I was so hoping to do some special things with him before. And WAIT A MINUTE, the other thing I worry about is those after pains. After Kaillan, I experienced after pains that sucked the life out of me. One of the nurses said it gets worse with every delivery and I remember very clearly thinking it couldn't possibly be worse than THAT. What happens after your fourth delivery when it's a c-section? Morphine? Death?
If any of you have an experience you could share with me, and trust me on this, I'll take anything, scary or not, could you send the details my way? Till then I'll just think about not eating.
For a moment here, I contemplated not updating you on the sickies in my house because what's complaining going to change anything. But this last weekend, as if it's possible, Remo, Brandan and Kaillan were struck by another gastro, albeit not the worst one. For anyone keeping track, that's 3 stomach flues for Kaillan in the last six weeks maybe, THEN yesterday Kaillan and Brandan started croup too. Just because I'm including the miserable details, I might as well add that Kaillan's body rash is still pretty bad, even though we've been putting cortisone on it. When Remo brought her to the pediatrician (again) this morning, she said it's too long now, and patches are getting worse even, she'll have to see a dermatologist now. Best, first appointment that doctor has available is May 28th. It's three weeks already, what's two months more??? Now I try to live a life with optimism so my UP spin on this is that there's probably not much out there left to catch. KNOCK ON WOOD.
Just when life at home is busy and we're in the middle of a major world conference at work, it's a big week in our house because a couple of elites in the iparenting world are coming to my house for a pyjama party. Alicia, Amy F. and Jen are coming this weekend for fun, frolicking and woohoo, gossip! Though I may need to be paid off for the biggest, juiciest details, good news is ALL of us are going to be writing up an entry about our escapades, I'll let you know how quick I can post them up. Maybe we can improve on the time set by the Seattle crowd?
On a sombre note, there's no doubt all of you are as preoccupied with the war as me. Watching the news yesterday, I mostly wished I wasn't. My heart and hopes go out to the families, and I wish strength and safety to all those in the middle of the mess. I feel very torn about writing about it given that I don't know how to express how I feel and that's mostly because I don't even know how I feel. Entirely. I believe in some of the arguments. I believe every single person in this world deserves protection. Unless they're evil. I just can't bare the thought of an innocent anyone being tortured or abused. Given where I work (UN), I work side by side with some people with very strong convictions. Some have given me insight, some made me nervous but all of them gave me something to think about. You can't watch CNN and get the whole story. I wish the pain would all go away. But how? When?
If anybody's interested, I have a cooped up four and a half year old I'm considering selling. Yesterday, while I was tidying up the guest bathroom, I noticed the light switch and plug covers are not actually the same colour cream. With all the problems in the word, I should be ashamed of myself, but anyway, the whole family ended up in there while I asked Remo if he'd ever noticed that before. Doesn't spiderman decide at that very moment to hang off the towel bar, in effect pulling down half the wall. (For those who weren't with us back then, it's a brand new wall). Later on that day when he wanted a peanut butter sandwich, he noticed we didn't have anymore bread upstairs. Since he turned one, he's always been impossibly independent and though I set limits, people insist one day I'll be grateful. The boy lives to do the vacuuming. Anyway, he went downstairs to the chest freezer, lifted up the lid, knew that he needed to hoist something in the back where the hinge is to keep the heavy door up so he could pull the bread out, shoved a vent cover in and single handedly dislocated the door. Trouble again, he could have killed himself had the door fallen on him. I don't know if he was stir crazy or what, but every ten seconds he was getting reprimanded for something. In writing this, I've given it more thought: he was pretty sick, bored out of his skull and Kaillan, a mess of her own rights, was tormenting him too.
I think maybe we'll keep him.
This time.
Allisun
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