Mystery

So for those of you who like mysteries...I've got one for you. After my 7 year old son Josh ate a few bites of watermelon, he ran around like mad playing soccer at 8pm...he had an Anaphylactic reaction??? How is that possible? He loves Watermelon, he eats a ton of it...can you really be allergic to watermelon...its' like 90% water?!

So here is what happened. We got home from a cub scout meeting and told the kids to get into their PJ's. About 10 minutes later Joshie looked like this! What was more alarming than his swollen face and eyes was his constant coughing and the fact that he was telling us he wasn't getting enough oxygen. As we grabbed for the benadryl we tried to figure out what he had eaten and what it could be. We couldn't come up with ANYTHING, there is no way it was the watermelon! Regardless...he was having an obvious anaphylactic reaction to something. I decided instead of giving Josh the EpiPen, I would drive him the 3 minutes to the Kids Care. Shawn stayed with the other kids and called ahead to the clinic. Which was great because the whole office knew the situation and 2 nurses were waiting for us in the lobby, they saw us and said..."This must be Josh!" ☻ and they took us right back.They quickly started the routine that I know all too well. The epinephrine shot, the Albuterol and the waiting. Although one big difference about this visit, is the the doctor (Wendy) stayed by our side almost the entire time we were there. She was not convinced it was the watermelon either and started asking other questions that I had already ruled out. She was not very comfortable at all with Josh's condition. While we were waiting she asked for yet another round of vitals and the nurses set in again for their forth check on Joshua's blood pressure, temperature, oxygen level and listening for that wheezing. She stepped back and told me his lungs were still sounding really bad and right on queue, Joshua started in on his rapid coughing. They got him another dose of Albuterol and again the doctor sat by my side and just stared at Josh. A few minutes went by and she asked for more vitals and then made the call that he needed even more epinephrine. As the nurse was giving Josh his next shot of meds the doctor informed me that because they had given two full doses of Epinephrine, Josh needed to be transferred to the hospital and that she would be calling an ambulance. This had only been about 45 minutes since I had gotten there. 3 years ago when Josh went to the instacare for a peanut allergy Josh was there for 2 hours and the doctor came in maybe twice! But regardless, the call was made and we were put into the care of Sean and Evan some great Paramedics who were brilliant with Joshua. Evan even told us that he would turn on the lights and honk the horn before we left so that Josh could get the full effect! The ambulance ride was probably the highlight of the night for him. Especially since as soon as we got into the back my phone started ringing like crazy from calls and texts I was receiving. Apparently Shawn had posted on facebook that Josh was being taken to the hospital via ambulance. Josh just grinned every time I would get off the phone and tell him which aunt, uncle or friend just contacted me and wished him well. BTW the ride was VERY bumpy, I had not expected that and when I mentioned this to Sean, his comment was that Cadillac certainly didn't built this vehicle. ☻ Once we were at the hospital they wheeled us through a ton of corridors and finally into a room where more people were waiting to take more vitals. They finished their assessment and told me that his lungs were coarse sounding but not wheezing...so he had finally gotten passed the scary part. He still looked pretty swollen, but at least he was off the oxygen. The doctors came in and wasn't too convinced it was watermelon either, but they also couldn't come up with an alternative. They decided that he needed to be given an IV in case they needed to get more medicine into his system faster. After two tries of FISHING around to try and get a vein the poor kid finally had his first IV (by far the worst part of this adventure, he tells me!). Dad showed up at about 11pm thanks to some wonderful Aunts (and of course facebook!) and we just sat there talking about the experience this far. The doctors put him on some steroids and tell us they will be keeping him over night to make sure he doesn't get the dreaded second wave that a bad anaphylactic shock can bring. About an hour or so later we got moved to our own room. I noticed the ceiling had cute designs and paintings on it and pointed them out to Josh. He looked at me and said "yeah, mom I saw them when they were wheeling me in from the ambulance!" Duh! It was decided that I would stay with Josh through the night (yeah, I love sleeping fully clothed...especially in jeans!) and dad would come get us in the morning. Josh and I had a great time getting woken up ever two hours or more for medicine, routine checks, wires accidentally falling off and having to get un-wired so he could go potty! That's what happens when they give him a ton of saline to try and flush out all the medicine...It was FAB! In the morning I took a picture of the two of us making it through the night together. I told him the last time just the two of us had spend the night in the hospital I was in the nice bed and he slept in a glass box next to the bed...but he wasn't about to trade me. He liked the fact he could control the angle of the bed! He was pretty excited when we were told he could order breakfast and he was even more excited when his breakfast tray came with a cute little toy holding a joke card! A few hours later we got good news, he was looking and sounding good and we could go home! Ya didn't have to tell us twice, we hit the door running...waving and thanking everyone as we went! Very nice hospital Primary's....hope he never has to go back! On the way home Josh realized that they forgot a few stickers on Josh's tummy. So we of course had to take a picture of them!

So up till today, we've had 4 pretty serious episodes with Josh, three of which landed him in the instacare or hospital (or both!). Egg, Peanut, Peanut...and the MYSTERY! Any guesses are welcome, his known allergies are peanuts, tree nuts, pet dander and weeds.

Well that was our adventure...hopefully soon we'll figure out why the heck that happened to him! Until then he won't be eating watermelon and then playing soccer at 8 O'clock at night! ☺