So Which One are We Choosing??

By "which one?" I mean which diagnosis! Callista has been in the hospital since Monday for vomiting. We took her to the ER on Friday and they did a shunt series and MRI, then sent us home. By Monday, she couldn't keep anything down and it was dehydrating her. In the ER, they insisted again on the shunt being the culprit. It was not. She was admitted and more testing was done throughout the week. For four days straight, if she was awake she was screaming in pain and having breath holding spells one right after another. I think we got maybe 9 hours of sleep total in those four days. She has been through several tests and procedures. Now we are playing the game where we try to see how many diagnosis we can go through.

1. Shunt-- Nope says Neuro
2. Kidney infection-- No way says Renal Scan and X-Rays
3. Shunt (again, seriously?)-- Once again, a big N-O from Neuro
4. UTI-- Yes actually, but it's still the same one from last time which apparently did not get cleared up.
5. G-tube ulcer- Scope says no, but there is a lot of irritation in her esophagus and stomach lining.

We are still admitted, I can't wait to see how many more we can add to our list and how many more times "shunt" comes up. To top it off, we were put on the junk floor over in the old part of the hospital. It's not the fact that it's an old room, but more that most of the people over there are clueless. Many of them refuse to listen to us as parents, there is only one space to sleep (one space, two parents, what to do?), and many of the people fluctuate from being TOO attentive and waking her up every five seconds, or not attentive at all, with alarms and beeping driving us nuts for long periods of time. Lucky us, after it was decidedly a GI issue, we got moved to the GI unit. One of our favorite nurses is taking care of her now, and I actually got some sleep. Nothing more exciting than that! It certainly isn't the way I wanted to spend my week or weekend but hopefully we've convinced GI that there's something more going on besides simple reflux.

Well, THAT was Fun....

We did our first PICC dressing change tonight. Here's how it's supposed to go: wash hands, undress baby, put masks on any adult within range as well as baby. Create sterile field, remove bandage, wash area with antiseptic swabs, replace bandage.

How it really goes: was hands, undress baby, put masks on mommy and daddy, mommy holds mask over screaming baby as best as she can while daddy retrains baby's swinging arm. Baby screams and screams and holds breath due to restraining. Try to locate the damn supplies you KNOW you brought in while trying to keep a sterile field, maintain holding mask over intermittent breath holding baby Daddy struggles to put new bandage on flailing arm. Finally get to take off masks and comfort baby. Endure glares from said baby for the rest of the evening.

Needless to say, I hope it's out before the next change is scheduled to happen! Now I am trying to cuddle on the couch and make up with my littlest love, who is clearly going to hold this against us for a bit. Her shunt revision is scheduled bright and early Friday morning. It should be a short surgery and a pretty short recovery time if all goes well. Please keep Miss Callie in your thoughts. And a big THANK YOU to the folks who have ordered from our Amazon link! We appreciate the help :)