Category Archives: mom

I’m a Fraud

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23

I’m one of those people who are generally pretty good in a crisis. I tend to remain calm while I’m going through it, but as soon as we’re “out of the woods” I break down.

When Taylor was 9 months old we couldn’t get him to wake up one Saturday morning. He’d sort of open his eyes, but didn’t seem able to keep them open. His little lips were gray and his breathing was shallow. Todd was very ill with pneumonia so I strapped Taylor into his car seat and made the 30 minute drive to the emergency room in about 15 minutes.

There was no waiting for me and we were taken into a private examination room instead of a curtained area. He was listless during their examination, he didn’t flinch when they swabbed his nose, and their faces told me a whole lot even though their mouths didn’t. It seemed like forever though it was only short minutes when the doctor said they needed to do a spinal tap to rule out meningitis and a nurse escorted me out of the room. His words were burned into my memory – “Your baby is very ill. You need to be prepared for anything.”

I knew what he was saying to me, but I refused to freak out because it wouldn’t do any good. We didn’t have cell phones at the time so I found the phone in the waiting room and called my frantic husband. I can only imagine his feeling of helplessness. He wanted to be right there, knowing what was going on. But it turned out he wasn’t even allowed at the hospital.

My sick child was so out of it he didn’t twitch or move a muscle when they did the spinal tap. But thankfully it wasn’t meningitis. It was RSV and severe dehydration. He was admitted to ICU for 24 hours until the crisis was past and then the general pediatric floor for four days after that. My parents still lived in California at the time and on day three my mother showed up at the hospital so I could go home, see Todd, have a shower, eat something normal, change my clothes. I wouldn’t leave Taylor alone and with Todd banned from the hospital because of his pneumonia I’d had no breaks. (Not knowing any of this was going on, Todd’s doctor wanted to admit him. When Todd explained our situation – and that it would be too much for me – the doctor agreed and made Todd promise to come into the office every day for a shot of something or other.)

I don’t believe I cried at all while I was in the hospital with Taylor. Never once. Partly because I didn’t figure it would do me any good and partly because I worried if I started I might not stop. And it wasn’t about me. It was about my baby. I had to be strong for him. You can bet I did a lot of praying, though. And so did my heathen (at that time) husband at home.

Todd’s cousin, Joe D., picked my mom up at the airport and drove her to the hospital. What a relief it was to see her. Taylor was still undergoing breathing treatments, but by this time it was clear he was going to be fine. I walked outside for the first time in three days and drove home – much slower than I’d driven there. I talked to Todd for a little bit and then went to take a shower.

You know how wonderful a hot shower feels when you haven’t had one in a few days and you’re feeling uber grungy? As the water washed the previous days away, so did the tears that came rushing out. I think I ended up sitting on the floor of the shower, arms wrapped around my knees and sobbing uncontrollably. Not tears of despair, but tears of relief and tears of gratitude to God. All the emotion I’d been holding at bay poured out. The dam was breached and there was no turning back.

After my shower I felt wonderful. Inside and out. I took the best nap of my life in my own, comfortable bed; I ate something besides hospital food; I spent a little time with my recovering husband; and as I drove back to the hospital I felt lighter than I had in several days.

That event is a rather extreme illustration of how I tick, but it’s the best example I could think of. And the reason I brought it up is because of my experience last week. I say I’m a fraud because I kept telling everyone I wasn’t worried about my bone scan. But it wasn’t just everyone else I was saying this to, it was myself. I must be a pretty good actress because I believed me.

After I’d received the call from the oncologist I made a few phone calls, sent some e-mails, posted here on my blog I ended up in a total funk. I didn’t react the way I had with Taylor’s ordeal, but I did have a bit of a breakdown in the form of withdrawal. I wanted to be with my family and I wanted to be alone all at the same time. I felt like one of those rubber band toys that you twist and twist and twist until it won’t twist any more and then you let it go. Except I hadn’t realized I was being twisted so taught until I was released.

I guess it was bothering me more than I appreciated. Even Friday morning as I was getting ready for my Homies (named for my ladies’ home team – bible study – by my fellow Homie, Tina) I was a bit funkitated. It was rainy and dreary outside and I was feeling blah. But just pulling up to the house we were meeting at was enough to make me feel better. And then those crazy women finished me off.

So you see. I’m not as brave and calm as I seem to be. Oh, I think I am at the time, but afterwards I realize I was just suppressing my anxiety. Still, this mechanism has served me well so I don’t imagine I’ll be changing any time soon.

And the last thing I have to say about that is this. Any perceived strength or bravery on my part is simply an extension of my faith. It’s the way God made me – a chip off my mother’s block – and it’s a gift. But I don’t handle anything without my God. When I start to feel anxious I ask for peace and He gives it to me. When I start to feel depressed I ask for joy and He gives it to me. And I love Him all the more for it.

Reason #7,384 Why I’ll Never Be Mother of the Year

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18

I just got back from the 7th grade nurse where I had to drop off paperwork and an Epipen for Katie “just in case”. When Katie was a very young toddler we discovered the hard way she had a peanut allergy. Thankfully she didn’t actually eat the PB&J I had made for her, only played with it. I don’t know if it’s because she was too tired to eat – we’d just gotten back from a hard morning of grocery shopping – or if she didn’t like it.

I was busy putting groceries away while the kids were eating lunch, but she was being so fussy. When I looked up I was shocked to see her looking something like Quasimoto with an eye swollen shut, the other very puffy and lips so big she couldn’t drink from her sippy cup.

I left the rest of the groceries, managed to get some benadryl down her and packed up the kids for the pediatrician’s office. One look at her when we walked in and our wait was extremely short. The few minutes we sat in the waiting room, however, was horrible. Parents looked at me like I had beaten my child. It was an easy assumption to make. Her swollen eyes were a reddish/purplish color and she just looked awful.

Scratch testing at the allergist’s office the following week confirmed she had a severe peanut allergy and mild allergy to most other nuts. The doctor then proceeded to scare me witless with stories of people dying of peanut allergies when they ordered chili from the new restaurant with a “secret ingredient” that happened to be peanut butter and stuff like that.

She has eaten things with almonds and pecans, though she’s not a big fan. Most people who are allergic to peanuts are not allergic to tree nuts – completely different family. As I said, she had a mild allergy to most tree nuts. If they show any symptom at all it’s just mild congestion. Nothing life threatening.

So when she was in second grade and wanted to try pistachios I said okay. Todd was at his parents’ condo in Little Rock hanging pictures and the kids were supposed to be helping me in the kitchen. Their job was to empty the dishwasher and both had grumbled about it.

She ate one pistachio, said it was okay and asked for another. So I let her have another. Then she started saying her tongue was itchy. “It’s just the salt making your tongue feel funny, Katie. You’re not allergic to pistachios.” She took a couple things out of the dishwasher and started complaining about her itchy tongue again.

I told her to go brush her teeth and rinse real good. She skipped down the hall to do what I told her, only to come back and say it didn’t work.

By this time I was getting exasperated at her use of a true medical problem she had to manipulate the situation. I truly, with everything in me, thought she was faking.

She walked over to the dishwasher again, pulled out an item or two, and complained about her itchy tongue.

“Kaitlyn Louise, you are NOT allergic to pistachios! Come here and I’ll prove it to you.”

She came over to me, I de-shelled a pistachio, ran it over her check and immediately a red welt sprang up. Um, apparently I was wrong.

I very calmly told Taylor to get his shoes on, grabbed some flip flops for Katie and called Todd while we drove to the hospital. By the time we got there about five minutes later she was talking funny as her throat was starting to close up. We walked in behind a teenage girl with a broken arm and her father, but when I said, “nut allergy,” to the triage nurse we were immediately seen by another nurse. She asked to look in Katie’s mouth and when she opened up my poor baby threw up.

That was all the nurse needed. Katie was in a hospital gown and hooked up to an IV faster than you can imagine. She was given epinephrine and benadryl – the epinephrine wiring her and the benadryl making her drowsy.

Todd showed up and offered to stay with her so I could take Taylor home, but I had done this to my precious little girl. There was no way I was leaving. Within an hour or two all the swelling had gone down and we were told as soon as the IV was finished she’d be able to go.

Before the IV was done, however, she broke out into traveling hives. They’d start out on her legs then clear up and show up on her back, moving from one spot to another. Instead of being released she was admitted to the pediatric floor for observation.

It was a rough night only because she was hooked up to a pulse-ox machine and every time she’d fall asleep it would go off. I don’t think it actually had anything to do with the allergy as I do the same thing when I’m in the hospital. But we didn’t get a lot of sleep that night.

Todd showed up in the morning and I did go home then to take a shower. She was released a little after lunch and was pampered silly after we got home. People sent her flowers and teddy bears and mom waited on her hand and foot. Guilt was definitely working in her favor.

She may have been whining about an itchy tongue at home, but she was so brave and hardly complained at all in the hospital. She actually looks back on that event with fondness. The cafeteria makes a mean chocolate cake and, ever my girl, she loves her some chocolate cake.

The next week we went back to the allergists and he did another scratch test. Sure enough, she had a rather quick reaction to pistachios. Still nothing like her reaction to peanuts, but now we just stay away from all nuts.

I still feel horrible when I think about that evening, but I’m so thankful it turned out okay.