I realize it seems odd to say Georgia was never a sick kid, but she wasn't.. never a cold, never the flu, nothing until all of this started. Over the past week I have been terrified, going back and fourth having no "norm" to guide me, do I have just a sick kid or is this something more serious?
Last Monday, Halloween we had clinic, Georgia threw up on the way there, I talked to the doctor about it.. her labs all looked great so we chalked it up to too much too early in the morning for her. By that evening Georgia had thrown up three more times and was really tired, something was wrong. I called her doctor in the morning and we both thought it seemed like a stomach bug. The insane world that I live in has me calling a pediatric oncologist to discuss such matters.
By Tuesday Georgia was still sick, Wednesday her stomach symptoms seemed to be getting better but Georgia wasn't emerging from her sickness.. Thursday morning I called her doctor. Georgia was sleeping all the time and crying when she was awake, grabbing at her head and obviously uncomfortable. We agreed that she should be seen. Two blood draws later we found out that Georgia was dehydrated - not surprising even though we'd been running pedia-lite through her ng tube. She received two bolus doses of fluid in the clinic which is a little more than half a liter. The hope was that the fluid would perk her up - no such luck.. instead she became puffy. Georgia had been off of her ng feeds for most of the week since she'd been throwing up and didn't have much of an appetite, needless to say she was a little shaky on her feet. The doctor asked us to have her walk, she didn't want to and was really unstable on her feet. From there the discussion turned to what else we might be dealing with - first thought was viral meningitis. We were sent from the Hem/Onc Clinic to the Emergency Department for a head CT to look for bleeding or swelling of her brain and to have a spinal tap - this is where I started to crumble. Georgia has been through enough trauma, she has more than risen to the occasion and I wanted it to stop. This was my first time back in the emergency department since the first night all of this began, not a place I wanted to return to. The head CT was horrendous, she was wrapped and velcroed to a table then slid into a giant machine.. Brian and I were on either side of her but she was terrified. All of this while the ED resident tagged along because he "wanted to watch"... from there she was sedated for the spinal tap and after she woke up we were sent to the SCCA floor to be admitted. Back to the same place we'd been one year ago.
The morning came with more labs which meant more pokes for Georgia. She was so upset to be in the hospital, becoming extremely upset whenever our hospital room door would open. Her eyes were almost swollen shut and a new crop of residents were all to eager to start morning rounds.
Further tests were taken, they checked for cancer cells in her spinal fluid, they took five cultures of her throat because she'd started having trouble swallowing and was throwing up mucus. Georgia made a little bit of progress, enough that I talked to the docs about waiting on an endoscopy to look for GVHD. All tests came back negative so Sunday we came home, yesterday Georgia was a bit better, today really tired again.
This could be a lot of different things - what I think and hope it is - I think Georgia did have a stomach bug, which would be hard enough for anyone with a normal immune system to fight off, then I think she became dehydrated and under-nourished which caused her body to lose ground. I think she is now fighting a new virus, something in her throat and she needs time and rest to be well again. All of this may be true, but in Georgia's life a possible virus leads you to a head CT and a spinal tap, days in the hospital and continued follow up from her teams of doctors.
Tomorrow we go to the SCCA to be evaluated by her Continuing Care Team, they will be running tests and looking for indications for GVHD.
Please send healing, healthy thoughts to Georgia - think of her as the Super Girl that she is and help us to move past this to a strong, healthy place.
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