Alter Ego: Hospitalised

It's been a week since we left the hospital, and Skylar is, thankfully, back to his usual happy and playful self. The hospital stay had traumatised him-- nurses would come into the room every hour or so to take his temperature and blood pressure, prick him for blood tests, give him his medicine-- that the first few nights after we got home, he would only sleep in my arms, and cry the second I lay him in his crib.

How did a regular cold turn out to be something so serious? He ended up with strep in his left eye, a strep throat( yifan and I both got it too!) and strep infection in his left shoulder. Those days were rough on everyone, and especially on Skylar. My poor baby had to undergo being pricked 7 times for the IV at Children's Hospital in Legacy ( all without any form of anesthesia!), go without milk for 13 hours before the MRI and operation, and then another 8 hours or so the next day for the PICC line insertion. He was so hungry and in such pain that he cried so much, he didn't have any more tears. My heart ached, and I wished I could take his place instead.

cheerful even with a cold

down with fever-- the onset of infection?

On Tuesday 29th Oct, we went to the ER at Children's Hospital at Legacy because I sensed that something was amiss because Skylar's temperature suddenly went up overnight, and seemed to have become sicker. Checks and tests then showed that he had strep in his left eye, and his throat was infected( prelim test showed it wasn't strep). The doctor didn't seem alarmed, so we were sent home with a prescription for some eye drops.

We were back at the ER the following day because this time, I knew something was really wrong with Skylar. He had been crying nonstop the whole afternoon, his fever was high despite taking Tylenol, and his shoulders were lopsided.

Then came the bad news-- the ER doctor discovered that Skylar had an infection in his left shoulder, most likely caused by the same bacteria that was found in his eye, and he would have to go to the hospital in Dallas. We spent the next couple of hours waiting for the paramedics to arrive to take him to the other hospital. In the meantime, the nurses tried to get an IV into Skylar ( 6 times they tried!), and failed each time. I had been told not to feed him, so by then, he was starving and tired, and crying in pain, it was heartwrenching to watch him.