A Night in the ER

I have friends who regularly spend time in the ER. I hate that they are familiar with the ER scene, but I love that they are my friends. They have changed me so much.....made me look at the world in a totally different way.....made me love the Lord in a way I didn't know I could. 

And tonight, I got a tiny, itty bitty glimpse of what they deal with. 

None of our kids have ever been to the ER. We took one of our foster babies for stitches in the ER once, but our kids have never been....until tonight. 

Around 5:00 pm tonight, Luke started complaining of a tummy ache. I am the mom who used to over react every time someone said their tummy hurt. But now I'm the mom who assumes that a tummy ache is nothing at all. 

So, that's what I did tonight. I assumed he was tired or hungry or needed to poop. I mean, what else could it be? 

But within minutes he was really complaining, and it wasn't like tummy ache complaining, it was something else. Addy and Brian were headed out the door for church, and I told them to go ahead. I was thinking that maybe he caught a bug at school. No biggie. 

Not 15 minutes after they left, he couldn't stop crying, and my momma gut told me that something else was going on, so I loaded both boys up in the truck, and headed to Urgent Care. 

{On a total side note. We have the most amazing Urgent Care center in Edmond called Edmond Urgent Care. The staff there is incredible. We never have to wait, and I trust them completely. If you live anywhere near 178th and Western in Edmond, this place is amazing and open 8-8 7 days a week.} 

When we walked in the door, I was carrying Luke and holding Wyatt's hand because Luke said he couldn't walk. They asked what was going on, and I explained that Luke was having acute pain in his lower left abdominal. They didn't even check me in or ask our name. They just said, "let's just put you in a room and have Dr. Tommie look at you....you may be in the wrong place." 

And that's what they did. They put us in a room, and Dr. Tommie was in the room within minutes. He checked Luke out, and told me that we should really go to the ER. 

So I drove right down the street to church where Brian and Addy were. We decided it would be best not to take Wyatt to the ER. Luke wanted his daddy to take him, so we switched cars, and I took Wyatt home. On the way home, Brian called to say that Luke had thrown up in the car and could we bring everyone some clean clothes. So we got home and packed up clean clothes, and headed to the ER. 

Wyatt and I stayed for a bit. Luke was already in triage. They were talking about a CT scan and labs and all the mess that comes with an ER visit. 

They really wanted to rule out appendicitis even though his pain was on the opposite side, they were still looking at it as a real possibility.  

We decided that I should take Wyatt home and get him to sleep. My brother-in-law and sister-in-law came over to sit with Wyatt and pick Addy up from church so I could go back up to the ER to be with Luke and Brian. 

By the time I got back, Luke had had 3 x-rays, had thrown up again, had started an IV with fluids and been given zofran. And right before I made it back to the room, Brian sent me this picture with the words "he just passed out." 

Excuse me? 

He immediately sent another text that read "sleeping."

Oh good. 

That's better than passing out. 

As I walked into the triage room, the assisting physician had an x-ray on her phone of a very giant piece of poop stuck inside my kid. 

Poor guy. 

We had originally ruled out constipation because he pooped just last night. The kid is the most regular pooper I've ever seen. Turns out, that mess can get stuck on the side wall of your intestines and the other poop can go around it for as long as it can, until eventually it gets so compact, that nothing can pass by. 

Who knew? 

So the poor guy was just severely impacted. That may be too much info for a blog post, but I'm writing it anyways. It's real life people. 

But before it turned out to be a not too huge deal, it was scary. My mind goes to the worse case scenario. They made it sound like appendicitis was a real possibility, or worse than that, it could have been something with his pancreas or colon.  

I am so grateful that our 1st ER visit turned out to be relatively uneventful. Now we just pray for poop. 

{AND....our Last Chance/1st Glance Open House is still on for tomorrow from 1-3 or 7-9. Stop by for the best goodie bags I have ever made!} I'm just saying : )