Brown and Pink Polka Dots : The January Sickness

The house has been hit by a bug. A coughing, sneezing, yucky bug!

Last Tuesday night it all started. Jillian would lay down, fall asleep for 10-15min and then wake up screaming. We did this until 12:30am. (It started around 10pm). We had no idea why she was screaming but with some Tylenol she finally slept for longer then 15min but was still up multiple times during the night.
Wednesday she was not herself. She just kinda sat at school all day. She did not do much. By the time we got home she had a 99.8 temp. The night started the same way. She would lay down, fall asleep for a little bit and then scream. Again the only way we got her to sleep was with Tylenol.
By Thursday morning she had a 100.3 temp so Brent stayed home with her. During the day she vomited 7x. We are not talking about a little spit up here. No we are talking about forcefully puking that starts with coughing... then starts gagging... then forcefully vomiting.... and ending with more coughing. We are talking about over 2+ ounces at a time. You can her her breathing in while vomiting, which is how she gets aspiration pneumonia. Now what does a child who has nothing in their stomach vomit? Well, a lovely mixture of stomach acid, liver bile and mucus. Her stomach can't handle anything in it. When she gets sick she gets mucus that drains into her tummy just like everyone else. The difference is that most other people can handle the mucus, but she can't so she vomits everywhere. Her lungs are also filling with mucus and she vomits (just like I did when I was little) to get the mucus out. This is making for a lot of vomit right now. She normally spends a good amount of time during her day swallowing reflux of stomach juices but at this point she is normally able to keep it in. By the time she went to bed on Thursday she vomited 3 more times.
Friday morning stated with vomit around 4am. Uncle Dan was able to work from home and take care of her. I was able to get off of work around 12:30 and come home. While Dan and Jilli were home in the morning I got to use my Christmas gift that Dan bought me... a house cleaner for a few hours to deep clean the house! When I got home I took over taking care of Jillian and she and I hung out. I was not feeling great with a runny nose and she was just exhausted. It was really good that I was home because during the afternoon I passed an ovarian cyst and had a hard time doing much. She continued puking and needing nebs through the day. Her temp got up to 101.1 during the day but by night it had dropped. She also started to refuse her oral meds on Friday. She would clamp her lips shut and try to slap the syringe away. Most of the time when we would give her a med she would vomit. Sometimes right way and other times up to a 1/2 hour later.
Saturday morning started with 4am puking again. We all slept in a little and then got up and got a few things done. In the afternoon she purked up and was acting more like herself, although still vomiting and refusing some of her meds. We were hopeful that the worst was over.
Sunday morning started the same with vomit around 4am. Brent had to be to Church early and Jilli and I were at my parent's house. She was still puking and pushing meds away. We were still doing nebs every 4 hours. We decided that it was time that she was seen. Mom and I took her to the Children's walk-in clinic on Mooreland road. We got there right as they opened at 11 and we are lucky we did . By the time we were walking into a room they were telling the people that were walking in that it was over an hour wait before they would be taken to a room! We did her weight which was off because she had all of her clothes on. I kinda wish I had made them do an accurate weight because I feel like she has lost weight in this sickness. We went to the room and the nurse did her vitals and her history. Her pulse ox was around 92. That is not where they want it. The nurse went out and I could hear her talking with the doctor. The doctor ordered a chest x-ray and a neb before she walked in the room so we could get those done as soon as she was done listening to her. She came in and listened to her lungs. She said that you could hear wheezing from her one lung and the other one was rattly. She left the room and the nurse came back in with the neb. As soon a the neb was finished someone from x-ray was there. Jillian hated getting the x-ray done. We walked into the room and she took one look at the machine and started to scream. I think she associates x-rays with tube changes because she normally grabs onto her tube and screams. The rooms do look similar. We got back to the room and her pulse ox was still only at 93 so they did another neb. The doctor also ordered some Prednisone to help with her lungs. A while later her pulse ox was back to around 91. Then she started to do the cough.. gag.. and then she vomited everywhere. Once she was done vomiting her pulse ox went up to 96 so they said we could go home. The doctor said the x-ray was cloudy but not pneumonia, just and upper respiratory infection. They also put her on an antibiotic for an ear infection. We left and mom brought Jillian and I back to our house. That evening my mom came back and we all had dinner together and mom spent the night.
Monday morning started the same with vomiting around 4am. My mom had the day off because of the holiday so she hung out with Jillian and Brent and I went to work. She slept really late and continued to need nebs every 4 hours however she was not puking as often. By the time I got home from work she was in a good mood and playing. I was hoping that all the meds had kicked in and she was really doing better. She even managed to unsnap her pajamas, pull her tube out of her clothes, open the g port and was chewing on the J port. It was hard to get her to sleep but by 9:30 she was out. I hooked up her pump and gave her a neb at 10pm. I could smell that she had pooped s I changed her, did her meds and she went back to bed.
Tuesday morning started out the SAME way with coughing and puking around 4am. Have I mention that 4am and I are NOT friends right now. Luckily I got up to her coughing and was able to catch what came out. Brent gave her a neb ad we watched some Full House while we tried to get her back to bed.
This morning when I got her up she had pooped everywhere. Then I went upstairs to get her drainage bag and somehow during the night it sprang and leak at the bottom so there was next to nothing in the bag but the floor was soaked. I looked over at her at one point this morning and noticed her g port was open and the little silicone piece that holds the cap on is hanging by a thread. Luckily we get that changed on Friday, so until then it is taped. A little while later she was sitting on the floor and all the sudden a volcano of poop starts flowing out of the top of her pants. Right now her poop is lovely with all of the mucus. Needless to say it has been eventful around here today.
She is in a good mood today and will play for a while and then just get so winded from playing and will just have to sit and breathe for a while. You can still hear her breathing across the room. Right now she is taking a nap and she keeps squeaking while breathing.

Her doctor's office called me on Monday because they had gotten a report that we had been at Children's and wanted to know what was going on. I filled them in. They called me back a while later and said that the doctor wants to stop doing any shots for a while since she always seams to get really sick after. It is like her body cant handle the knock in immunity so then she gets every little thing and they really kick her butt.

Right now I am not sure of the coarse of this illness. I feel like one moment she is starting to act more like herself and then the next she is crashing again. I think if she is still not doing better by tomorrow she will need to go see a doctor again because at that point she will have been on steroids and antibiotics for 4 days. We are trying to be patient and wait this out but we don't want this sickness to get out of hand. So we will see what tomorrow brings and just hope that we sleep past 4am...