ER Visit

By now you guys probably know that I try to post at least once a day every weekday. If you don’t see a post from me…there’s probably a reason 😉 Here’s one of my rare “current life” posts!

Sunday night I decided to go to bed EARLY. I’d been staying up late and getting up early for a few days in a row and we have a BIG week this week (Zach’s birthday…Kye’s open house…something going on every day!) and I wanted to start off the week refreshed with a full night’s sleep.

I hopped in the shower as soon as the kids were asleep then Zach and I watched Big Brother. During Big Brother (around 8:45) Zach started saying he felt really sick to his stomach. He ended up going to the bathroom and I could hear him throwing up. My first thought was food poisoning. He had is a few years ago from some Popeyes (never ate that again!) so I thought maybe it was from the McDonald’s we’d had the day before? We finished the episode and he was going back and forth to the bathroom. I felt bad b/c there wasn’t really anything I could do. We decided I’d go sleep upstairs so he could have the bathroom and our room to himself for the night.

By 10:00 he was really sick. It was coming from both ends and he was hurting. I was in the bedroom and he was in the bathroom when he told me we needed to go to the ER. We don’t go to the ER. We’re not hospital types. We’re not very dramatic and don’t make a big deal out of stuff. We’re both pretty level headed in any emergency type situation. Plus we have horrible major medical insurance and we’re both cheap 😉 The only time I’ve ever been to the ER (other than my car wreck in high school…) was when Zach stabbed himself in the hand with a kitchen knife back when I was pregnant with Kye. If Zach says he needs to go to the hospital, he means it.

I called my mom right away. When she didn’t answer I called Mr Rusty. Mom called in while I was on the phone with him so she ran to the house to sit with the kids. While we waited for her I gathered up the essentials that I thought we’d need. Zach was hanging onto the sink, shaking really badly. He kept saying he was going to pass out. I have no clue how long it took Mom to get to our house (I mean she lives down the street so it couldn’t have been long) but it felt like an eternity. She got there and helped me get Zach to the car. He’s a BIG DUDE. If he passed out on us we’d have to call and ambulance and we def don’t want that bill! 

I raced him to Smith Northview as it’s the closest hospital to our house. I stopped the car in the middle of the street and Zach opened his door but either passed out or semi passed out or something as he didn’t get out. I yelled to some random guys that I needed help. Only ONE of them came to help me. I mean seriously?!?! The other guy just stood there. So me and this guy carry Zach inside. He passed out while we were carrying him. I felt the need to keep telling everyone that he doesn’t do drugs. The way he was acting was like people in movies that are overdosed on drugs. I kept saying “he’s not ODing” hahaha

I yelled to the other guy to go get a wheelchair and then to shut Zach’s car door. A hospital staff guy brought a wheelchair, wheeled Zach into the waiting room then LEFT. So I’m sitting there with him while he’s violently shaking. He passed out on me and was laying his head on my body so I just held him while other people in the waiting room were freaking out. This one chick kept yelling “His eyes are rollin’ back! His eyes are rollin’ back!” What could I do about it?!?! I mean SOMEONE get up and HELP ME then!!! 

In that moment I thought “this is it.” Zach and I have both always feared something will happen to him. I’m sure most people worry about that kind of thing but illnesses run in his family (his mom and sister both have bad autoimmune diseases) and it would kill Zach if he were disabled in someway and not able to provide for his family. Sitting there holding his head and feeling helpless was the only moment I allowed myself to worry. I quickly snapped out of it and realized that worrying wouldn’t do any good. I told someone to get some help. I mean we didn’t need all of this taking place in the WAITING ROOM. I thought emergency room meant you got help quick?!?!

Some lady got up and banged on the glass window and demanded help. They were all a nice bunch and told off the guy that had brought us the wheelchair. He was getting paperwork for me to fill out while my husband was passing out every 5 seconds. Not cool. 

They got us back and asked us a bunch of questions. I again felt the need to say he doesn’t use drugs. I also felt bad that I don’t know his entire medical history. I told them he’s had his appendix out as well as his back surgery but I forgot to tell them about his tonsils. I don’t think it mattered though. He was shaking so, so bad and said he didn’t have control over his limbs. His eyes were bright red and it was creepy looking. I think the staff was pretty afraid of him. He was yelling out in pain and had this look of horror on his face that I won’t ever forget. Selfishly I really, really wanted to leave. I do NOT like hospitals and do NOT like seeing someone I love in a hospital bed. Especially not when he was in such bad shape.

Everything felt like it took forever. It felt like everyone was rude to us but, looking back, I realize now that they were really concerned and just trying to do their jobs as fast as they could. They put a catheter in him. And omg. It was HORRIBLE. I was holding his hand and thank the lord he told me to let go b/c he would have FOR SURE broken it. Zach is SUCH a manly man. He’s a tough guy. He doesn’t show weakness. He’s one of those “man up” type guys who rarely even shows emotion. He was in the worst pain of his life in that moment. He screamed so loud. I almost passed out. I had to grab a puke bag for myself and I decided to call his dad back. I needed support. If this was only the beginning of the night I wouldn’t be able to handle it the rest of the night…

Thankfully the catheter was the worst of it all. We actually found out when a different nurse took it out that the guy who put it in was VERY rough and didn’t properly do it. If you’re EVER in a position of needing a catheter put in (especially if you or your spouse is a man!) then tell them to put TONS of lubrication on it. This guy hadn’t put any AND tell them to go easy. It should not be super painful, like i was for Zach. I felt even more bad for him after finding out he went through unnecessary pain. Poor Zach. After he had it put in the nurse guy told him that after that pain he’s almost experienced the pain of childbirth. Kinda made me laugh…I bet Zach does have a whole new appreciation for me giving birth drug free 😉 They gave him an IV of fluids and meds (don’t ask me what?!?) and he wasn’t feeling much better. Still shaking. Still vomiting. When the doctor was checking him he said “Check me for Cancer. I have Cancer.” It was SO random. I laughed out loud, even then, at him. But he sells Aflac for a living and one of the main products he sells is the Cancer policy. He files cancer claims ALL the time and people do find out they have it in the most random ways. So I can see why he thought that. They did not do any type of cancer check…but they did do an EKG on him. I think they thought he may have been having a heart attack? The meds did finally kick in though so he went in and out a lot.

When he was awake he kept apologizing. I kept telling him not to worry. His #1 concern was the money. Our deductible is $5,000 EACH. We’ve met Kye’s for the year (and are still paying off his surgery) but we aren’t at our out of pocket year maximum so this little trip will cost us. But HELLO. We NEEDED to be there. I kept reminding him that he did awesome just by not passing out till we got to the hospital. I kept reminding him that an ambulance would have been way more expensive. I hate that we have to worry about finances in this type of situation. All he should have been worried about was getting better. Also while he was awake he kept saying how much pain he was in and kept asking me to pray for him. I’m so not used to him admitting any weaknesses. It was heartbreaking. I’m very thankful he told me to pray because honestly I was so busy with worry that I forgot to pray. I understand the value and importance of asking others for prayer now. When you’re in those situations you NEED others to lift you and your loved ones up because you’re too crazy yourself to be able to take the time to do it. So thank you for those of you who were up at 11:00 Sunday night and saw my prayer requests on Facebook 😉

His mom got up there and moved my car from the middle of the parking lot for me. I thought they’d let her stay back with us but they wouldn’t. They also told me I couldn’t leave him because they were afraid how he’d act when he woke up (at this point he was out!). They were all afraid of him. Which is hard for me to imagine b/c he’s ZACH but from an outsider perspective he is BIG and he was LOUD and screaming and acting pretty harshly to everyone (I later told Zach that I saw a glimpse of my future when I have to take care of him in his old age and it ain’t pretty…). I know I am a butt sometimes when giving birth so I was patient with him. He was in a lot of pain and I tried to “coach him” through it by reminding him of the Bradly Method techniques of relaxation. It annoyed him quickly 😉 I felt guilty asking Mrs Charlotte to come up there when she couldn’t even stay back with me and I couldn’t even go sit with her. So annoying! She did come back for a second to see him and then waited in the waiting room. We texted back and forth some as I sat in the complete darkness, trying to let Zach sleep. I was also sitting on the floor by his bed as it was the only outlet that worked and, of course, my phone was going dead. I was just SO worried that Mom would text me that Kye was awake vomiting. I could just picture me having to go get him and bring him to the ER too!

The dr. told me that all of the lab work came back fine. That he basically had a case of the “HIIK” (Heck if I know haha). He told me that Zach should start feeling better but that he couldn’t believe he was so bad off in under 2 hours after the sickness first set in. He said the shape Zach was in when we got there that he had thought Zach was dying. Um. Why would a dr tell me that?!?!? I could have gone my entire life not knowing that a doctor thought my husband was DYING. Thanks guy!

They told me that Zach would be okay and that we’d most likely be able to go home that night, but it’d still be a few hours. It was close to midnight so I text Mom to let her know. I figured it’d be best for someone to just spend the night there and go ahead and go to bed up in our guest room. Mrs. Charlotte ended up going to our house and spending the night so Mom could go home. Thank God she went ahead and did that! I spent some time in the waiting room with her talking while letting Zach sleep. When she left I went to go back to Zach’s room and they told me they had moved him. He had woken up and was needing to go to the bathroom and they had a room open with a bathroom attached. 

When I walked in the new room I could hear him vomiting. At that point he’d be given two rounds of the anti-nausea meds plus two doses of some medicine to take the pain away.  How the heck was he still so sick? Thankfully his color looked SO much better. And he wasn’t shaking. But still, it wasn’t good that he was still so sick. The nurse was SO much nicer at that point though. He told us that they were going to give Zach some gingerale but that if he couldn’t keep it down they’d have to admit us to the hospital. While we were in there this lady came in with this HUGE machine to do some chest x-ray on him. Um, why? I 100% trust medical staff and do not question things but this didn’t make sense. So I nicely and politely explained to her that he had stomach issues…nothing with his heart…she asked the dr and I guess he had ordered it when we first got there (again, I’m thinking they thought it was a heart attack???) and they had just then brought the machine. Good thing his heart WAS ok!!! She was super sweet about it and I’m thankful for the error because not needing that done saved us some money 😉

He didn’t pass the ginger ale test 🙁 He was on meds and had an IV and still couldn’t keep things down. The nurse explained to us that if we went home I’d just have to bring him back and we didn’t want to risk him passing out where I couldn’t help him OR the kids seeing him in that condition (praise GOD they were asleep when all of it happened the night before!) So at 2 am we got admitted into the hospital. They gave him more meds and ice chips and they hooked me up with an awesome recliner. Oh my goodness…I have a total new appreciation for Zach and Casey who have both spent the night with me in the hospital after giving birth. That junk was SO uncomfortable!!!!!! By the time we were settled in the room it was after 3:30. I don’t remember much of them coming in and out for the next couple of hours, because I myself was asleep. I do remember our ER nurse bringing me a heated blanket and laying it on me. SO thoughtful as it was FREEZING in our room!

I set my alarm and got up at 6:30 to go home to nurse Brittlynn. I feel so bad for Mrs. Charlotte. Her son was in the ER and she had to drive there then go stay at our house for us. She herself HAD to take her meds but they were at home (she had only planned to visit the hospital for a little bit, not stay the night somewhere!) so she had to arrange someone to come sit with my kids so she could go home to get her meds that morning. Mema and Jolee came and I was SO embarrassed at the state my house was in. Ugh. I hate people seeing my house in less than pristine clean condition!

I am SO thankful for Mom coming to our house so we could go to the ER, to Mrs. Charlotte for going ABOVE and beyond for us, and to Mema and Jolee for getting up early to come to our house for us! And I’m also thankful to Rachael who happened to be up at 1 am (who the heck is awake then?!?) and commented on my FB so then I was able to text her. It was good to have someone to “talk to” during it all 😉 I nursed Brittlynn and got the kids breakfast going then went back up to the hospital. I told everyone NOT to visit us that day as he needed REST. If we’re spending the money for him to be in a hospital bed you better bet he was gonna get all the peace and rest he could possibly get that day!

They had told us when we got admitted that we would probably be in there until Tuesday morning as they’d most likely want to monitor him for 24 hours. Awesome. They also told us a dr would be by to see us at 8:00. At 10:00 he finally came in. He asked why in the world Zach had a catheter. I swear I could shoot someone. People are so dumb sometimes! My poor husband went through excruciating pain for that catheter. If you don’t think he needed it then KEEP IT TO YOURSELF! I had to remind Zach that he was in really, really bad shape and that this dr didn’t see him in that condition so he can’t really judge why that staff did it. The dr was nice though and told us we could go home! He said it would take 45 min and then we’d be outta there!

I ended up running back home to nurse Britt for her 11:00 feeding because no one had even come to take out the catheter at that point. Mrs. Charlotte was back then. I filled her in on everything I could and I fixed the kids lunch. Poor Kye. He knew something was up (we just told him Daddy was sick and was at the doctor). He acted out and I had to give him a spanking for his attitude 🙁 He was so, so, so upset. He kept asking for Daddy so I told him that Daddy would FOR SURE be home when he got up from his nap. I could tell that wasn’t going to cut it and that Kye needed to see him before he went down. 

On the way back up to the hospital (it was noon) I called Zach’s room and he said NO ONE had been to see him STILL. I was ticked. I get it that things are crazy…so just be honest with us ya know? Say “you can go home today but it’ll be several hours to get you out of here” don’t tell us 45 min and then over 2 hours later not even have his catheter out!!! When I got there I went to the nurses station and the doctor was standing within ear shot of me. I was super sweet (I am big about being OVERLY nice in this type of situation..you get more flies with honey right?) and talked to one of the nurses and explained that our three year old needed to see his daddy and that we had been told it’d be 45 min at 10 am. I whispered and asked if I should talk to the dr about it and she said no, that she would handle it. 

About 10 min later a nurse came in and said she was impressed at how I lit a fire under the dr butt 😉 She took the catheter out and was SO gentle about it. This time around I left the room…I didn’t want to see Zach in that pain again. It was 1:30 before we got to leave and I took a little cat nap in the chair while we waited. The sweet nurse wheeled Zach out of the hospital. While I went to get the car Zach asked her about a bracelet she was wearing. She told him that her son committed suicide in 2008 LIVE on the internet with 2 MILLION people watching him and not one person called the police or got help to try to stop him. Can you imagine?!?!?!?

Her telling him that story really just put things in such perspective for us. She was SO sweet and told him that after that she just wants to help other people and that it helps her pain be able to take away someone elses. Yes, what we went through was horrible but, like Zach said, it doesn’t compare to what she’s been through. He felt guilty complaining about that catheter after that!!!

Once home Zach went into see Kye even though he was already down for his nap. Mrs. Charlotte (have I mentioned this woman is a SAINT?!?) ran out and got Zach’s prescription as well as lots of gatorade for him to stay hydrated. I went to SLEEP. My bed has never felt so amazing!!! Zach stayed upstairs the rest of the day and that night just to make sure he was far away from the kids. So he could rest but also to, hopefully, prevent them from catching it. 

We’re still not sure if it was a virus or was some type of food poisoning? We are praying that if it was viral that our children will not catch it next! Experiencing my husband in that state was horrible. I cannot fathom watching one of my children in that kind of pain. 

Today Zach is feeling much better! Still weak, but better, and he is able to keep food down. We’re being cautious but don’t want to let any of this ruin his big birthday today either!!! I went to bed SUPER early last night and am feeling well rested today and have been busy busy busy catching up on everything and getting stuff ready for Zach’s bday celebration tonight!

Thank you again for the prayers…they were answered 🙂 I’m so thankful it wasn’t something more serious and that Zach pulled through it all okay. There were some scary moments but overall I’m proud of how strong I stayed. Zach is the strength and he supports ME and holds ME up. This was a role reversal time and I’m proud that I was able to be his rock and support him when he needed it most.  Please pray that the worst is behind us and that this junk can somehow miss me, but especially the kids!!!

PS: Sorry no exciting hospital pictures…1) Zach’s gown barely covered anything so the hospital staff got enough of a show for all of you 2) I was ready for BED when we went to the ER so I looked awesome 3) For once in my life I actually didn’t even have my camera with me. Now you KNOW that it was an emergency!!! 😉