Abby was incredibly lethargic and sleepy that entire day, and I passed it off as it being an "eventful" day with blood drawn, a doctor appointment, and friends visiting at the home. As the evening progressed, I was noticing the long stretches between dirty diapers and feedings, and Chris noticed that she was turning more and more yellow. Usually Chris and I are both tired and in bed by eleven these days, but for some reason, midnight was here and we were both wide awake. Chris eventually started to seem concerned about her lack of activeness as well as coloring, so he started searching the internet. We decided it'd be best to call the pediatrician and describe the symptoms we were seeing. The nurse on-call was concerned that Abby was dehydrated, which can cause the jaundice to progress. So she recommended we head to the ER and get Abigail checked. So around 1:30 am we were headed to the ER and were not prepared for what was to come.
When we got there, they did the normal check up routine, and then sent us off to a room where we waited for the doctor to come in and share with us what he was planning to do. He told us Abby had a fever, which was a concern, and he wanted to draw blood, urine, and spinal fluid to test for meningitis among many other things. My 3 am emotional state was not prepared for that, and I broke down into tears. I feared the worst. God please help her. Heal her. I can't lose her. Not another baby. I look back now and am obviously grateful for his answered prayers, but also felt the doctor could have been a little less blunt and not scare me to death! I mean come on! It's 3 in the morning, I had been awake for at least 20 hours at that point. I was not ready to hear those concerns. At any rate, they spent the next two+ hours working on getting her IV in, starting in her head, then one hand, then finally succeeding in her left hand. They continued to take her temperature rectally throughout the night and pumped her with tons of fluids. She was so dehydrated that her urine was too thick for the first culture sample. Then came the spinal tap, which was hard to watch. She just sat there, her limp little body, so lethargic she didn't even cry.
Once samples were taken and given to the lab, they called the ambulance to transport Abigail over to UMC. The ambulance arrived some time around 7 am Saturday morning. I rode in the ambulance with Abby and Chris drove our car from the NW ER to UMC. By the time we arrived at UMC I was so tired and so emotionally exhausted that I can recall just sitting in the hospital room, tears running down my face, trying to stay awake as I waited for Chris to arrive. The time seemed to stand still as I tried to recall and take in all that was happening. It felt like the movies, where I was sitting there in the chair in my own still silence as the doctors, nurses, and paramedics rushed around me like a whirlwind. Chris arrived only a few minutes after I did, but it seemed like an eternity. A few hours later my parents came, and they watched Abby and let Chris and I go home to sleep for a few hours and prepare bags for the hospital stay. Meanwhile, they tested Abby's jaundice level again, and it was up to 16.5. They still felt that wasn't too concerning, and just encouraged us to keep feeding her regularly as well as managing her output (to put it kindly!). By Sunday her jaundice was almost completely gone, and Abby was much more active and awake and much less lethargic.
We ended up staying at UMC for a total of 4 days, which was absurdly too long. Sadly we were waiting on the urine culture that didn't even get sent out until the day we left. Apparently the urine went on traveling-spree, and traveled from the Northwest ER to LabCorp, who then sent it on vacation to North Carolina. It was incredibly frustrating to sit and wait on that one item, but we knew it was for her best interest that they were keeping us there. On Tuesday morning we still were not sure whether we'd be able to go home or not, so our awesome pastor's wife came to stay with Abigail as my mom and I got ourselves out and about for a few hours. Thankfully the doctor called us with good news, and told us we'd be able to head home later that afternoon. All the tests came back negative and Abby was good to go! We were so happy and so grateful that she was healthy again. Going in to the hospital she weighed 7 lbs 9 oz, during the stay she got up to 8 lbs 14 oz, and when we left she was around 8 lbs 11 oz.
They never quite figured out what exactly Abby had contracted. They feel that whatever she did have, we managed to catch before it ever progressed and that the IV treatments they were giving her prevented anything from getting worse. I am just thankful for Chris' intuitions and concerns and that we took action as soon as we did. I thank God he gave those thoughts to Chris and not to me. I would have probably passed them off as not much of a concern, as I had previously done that day. We are also very thankful for an amazing hospital and the nurses and doctors there. They were all incredibly kind, helpful, and skilled at their jobs. We thank God for the gift of modern medicine!
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