Sick Little Tin Man

We've had quite the adventure over the last week. Tanner woke up pretty sick one morning. Throwing up and so so tired. It was his first time missing school. He hardly ate anything and slept the majority of the day.

I made up a bed for him on the couch with a puke bucket and Daddy's Iron Man blankie.

 The second day was the same. No eating, still throwing up and sleeping all day long. At this point we were getting concerned about dehydration, so we tried to make sure he was drinking enough.

 

The third day he seemed a little better. He had stopped throwing up, but was till refusing to eat and would not stay awake for longer than 20 minutes at a time. I called the Dr this day and the nurse I spoke to said that it seemed like he was on the mend, so I didn't need to have him seen.

 

On day four he was finally starting to perk up! I finally got a few smiles out of him on that day, and was half willing to eat. He still wasn't very active and sleeping a lot. I just credited it to him being sick and his body trying to recover. That night when he went potty his urine looked very dark. We were worried he did end up getting dehydrated, so we started making him drink more. 

On day five I posted on FaceBook that he was finally feeling better! But I spoke too soon.  He was already very weak from the last few days of not eating and just feeling crumby, but it seemed like something else was up as the day went along. I decided to not take him to school again. He went potty and this time his urine was even darker. He also said how it hurt him to go potty so I decided to call the Dr again. We made an appointment for him later in the day. They were able to squeeze us in for the last appointment of the day.

 

We got to the Dr and the one we saw (he wasn't our usual NP, he was the night Dr that night) started looking very concerned about Tanner. He said he just looked more sick than the usual sick kick that comes into the office. So he ordered urine and blood tests. I was sad because I told Tanner all he would have to do was pee in a cup and that he wouldn't get poked.

The urine test came back with high protein, so everyone was worried there was something wrong with his kidneys. The Dr also said there was high glucose in his urine, and that could mean diabetes. At that point I just about lost it and started crying even though I was trying my hardest to not cry in front of Tanner. He was already so scared.

 

We were still waiting for the blood test to come back, and when it did the Dr called the kidney Dr up at Primary's to see what he thought of it. During this wait time he wanted us to stay in the office. He also said that it was a good possibility we were going to go up to Primary's that night. 

As we were waiting for the blood test to come back Tanner all the sudden started feeling a lot of pain. He was pointing to his bladder. My dad said it could be a good sign that he's complaining about his bladder, and that it's hopefully not his kidneys. He also told me different symptoms of diabetes and going to the bathroom a lot was one of them. So I wasn't very worried about diabetes anymore since Tanner had hardly been going (which is pretty normal for him anyway).

The blood test came back with nothing alarming and the Dr at Primary's agreed. So we decided to give him an IV for fluids, take more blood for a bunch more tests and some Tylenol to help with the pain then we could go home and avoid the Hotel on the Hill depending on how he did. It was the same lady that poked him the first time that came to do the IV. She felt so bad that she had to put him through all of that again, but she was so impressed on how good Tanner was! He only yelled once with the initial poke, and held very still the entire time. She said she hasn't ever had a 4 year old that was so good. That's my tough little guy!

She mentioned a lot how tiny he was. I figured she wasn't used to giving IV's to anyone as small, or smaller than Tanner. Or maybe she just meant how small he is for his age. I dunno, but I loved hearing that he's a little thing.

 While we were waiting for the IV to finish up he was already starting to perk up. He started talking more and asking questions. He even started to joke around a bit. I was so happy to see this! The Dr was pretty happy as well, so he sent us home!

 

When we got home Kollin and Chase were hanging out downstairs with Grandma, Troy and Cadence. Tanner actually played! He was sitting up on his own and was playing with a pretty new cool toy the Cadence got for her birthday. We were all SO happy to see this!

 

The  next morning, day 6 (St Patrick's Day), he was doing great. His urine was till a little dark, but a huge improvement from the 2 previous days. He was awake all day long and started eating much better. I was cautiously optimistic since that was what he was doing the day before when he ended up going back downhill a the day went on.

 

Luckily we didn't have to wait long for one of the blood tests to come back. The nurse called me and she said that here was not anything concerning in the numbers he was showing! That was a huge relief, but we were still waiting on the urine culture and 4 more blood tests which wouldn't come back for at least another day. I also told her how he was doing really well and she was very happy to hear it.

We spent most of the day downstairs with Grandma. I think that really helped him with the change of scenery, and wanting to get up and play with the babies and Cadence's new toys.

On day seven he was still improving! Definitely not 100% better, but SO much better than he had been. He was still pretty weak but I thought  was doing well enough to go back to school. I spoke with his teacher to let him know how he was doing and to give me a call if it seemed like he was going down hill again.

 

When I went to pick him up from school he was playing with his classmates. His teach said he did very good. He was mellow during recess, but was great otherwise. He even ate green eggs!

 

After school both boys had a babysitting play date with Coop and Emmy. I had a nail client I had to go to instead of her come to our home, so luckily Aubrey was able to watch the boys for me. While I was doing my client's nails I got the phone call with the rest of the results of the urine culture and blood tests...

  

Everything was great! The nurse said some numbers were a little high, some were a little low, but nothing was at a level for being worried. I told her how well he had been doing and that his urine was all the way back to normal as well, so with the good tests and him feeing much better she was very happy.

 

The following Friday (day 9) we had a follow up appointment with Tanner's NP to double check his urine again. As we were waiting in the room he came bursting through so fast he just about knocked it over. With wide eyes he asked what happened with Tanner! I explained everything and how much he's been improving. His urine test showed everything is now back to normal!

 

He sad it must have been a crazy bug that made his kidneys freak out. He was so happy to hear how well Tanner has been doing since getting that IV d mentioned that that other Dr could have saved his life.

 

It was quite a week that I am happy to have behind us. He is doing so great now. We are all so happy he is out of the woods and that our sweet and spunky Tanner is back! He sure knows how to keep us on our toes!