Stop Thinking About Me

Last week.

I want to forget last week.

I am tired.

I am tired and it is mostly due to one child.

Isobel.

She is on a roll.

Last week at 11:00am my cell phone alarm went off for Holden to take his first dose of anti-seizure medicine for the day. I am thinking that I am teaching him some kind of responsibility in asking him to bring me his medicine, but really it is because I have one million other things going on that it is just easier to ask Holden to help out. He runs and brings me the small bottle (with a child-proof lid) and the medicine plunger to measure out his dosage. After he takes his medicine I send him off to put his medicine back on the shelf. And then I forget about the medicine, because I don’t have to think about it again until 8:00 at night.

Then at 11:30AM, just thirty minutes after “medicine time”, I hear Holden screaming, “Mom! Isobel is drinking my medicine!” I get up to look for Isobel and take the bottle away from her, but I do not panic because I know that I screwed the child safety proof cap back on tight.

Then I find Isobel. With Holden’s medicine. With the lid off. Drinking Holden’s medicine. Happily drinking it.

Panic.

I grab my cell phone and dial poison control.

The verdict? Take Isobel to the Emergency Room.

Now.

I have no idea how she got the cap off. Maybe I didn’t screw it back on tight like I thought. Maybe she is channeling She-ra Princess of Power and twisted it off on her own. I load up the boys and Isobel and head for the ER. On my way I call my mom and ask if she could please pick up Olivia from school since I did not know how long I would be. 

I get to the front desk, “Poison Control said they would call you and let you know that I was on my way with my baby….”

To which the very “sensitive” woman behind the desk answers, ”Oh yes, the OD?”

WHY ON EARTH WOULD SHE SAY “OD” IN FRONT OF ME ABOUT MY BABY!?!  

We get checked in and are shown to a room in the back. Isobel is calm and thus far no change in behaivior. Then I set her on the hospital bed and start to change her into the hospital gown. This is where she starts to freak out and scream. I think memories from the week before getting her blood drawn are coming back to her. She is inconsolable.

The nurses bring in a small selection of movies hoping that Isobel would calm down watching them. …At least it kept the boys entertained.

After the doctor comes in he tells me that we could be there for eight hours.

Panic.

My panic is not for Isobel. Panic because how am I supposed to entertain two small boys for EIGHT HOURS while trying to make Isobel comfortable.

Super Mammy to the rescue. She shows up within twenty minutes to pick up the boys. Thank you mom!

Isobel is hooked up to three chest monitors, one toe monitor and a blood pressure cuff that prevents her from bending her elbow. She HATES it.

I try to calm her down, but nothing is helping at this point. Then they bring in lunch for both of us. She was starving, because she ate Holden’s medicine right before lunch. Apparently it’s not too filling. Mmm… peanut butter and jelly, almost as yummy as Holden’s medicine. She calmly and happily eats her lunch.

Isobel is content to sit on my lap for the first few hours that we are there, but she soon realizes that she wants to move. Which leads her to discover that it is hard to move when you can only go as far as your blood pressure cuff will allow.

The doctor explained that the only big side affects to the medication are drowsiness and behavioral problems (to which I assure him the the fit until she gets food and the fit because she is hooked up to the wires are NOT out of character for her) and then he explains that there are no real serious problems caused from taking the medicine, for example it doesn’t cause seizures. I didn’t have the heart to tell him that I knew that the anti-seizure medicine did not cause seizures. He may not have found that too funny.

The nurses came in and unhooked Isobel from the monitors so I could get her to take a nap. She was in Heaven! She bolted out of the open door before anyone could catch her. She did not like going back into her room.

I soon got her down for a nap around 3:30 and within twenty minutes a nurse comes in to wake her to make sure she was able to wake up. She opens her eyes, whimpers and falls back asleep. Ten minutes after that another nurse comes in to re-attach Isobel to the monitors. Good news, I don’t have to claw the nurses eyes out. She stays asleep until about 4:45.

When Isobel first woke up with all of her chords and wires back on she was not as mad as she was before. She would take her toe monitor off and listen to the beeping and then ask for me to put it back on. …Repeat. At least she wasn’t crying.

Then Gary showed up. I know he was there to see his Isobel, but I like to think that he was there for me, my knight in shining armor ready to make everyting better. Gary has magical powers like that, you know.

I was glad that Gary was there to help me as Isobel fought with the chords that she hated and wanted out of that room. That girl can throw a fit. At least we got her to stop hitting everyone. Now she just hits everything.

Shortly after this video the doctor came in with Isobel’s discharge papers and we were clear to go home. Isobel is fine and back to eating weird things. I caught her licking a dishwasher soap cube yesterday. Ugh. Is anyone else thinking Pica?