Tuesday, December 01, 2009

Dear stomach flu, please please please leave us alone now.

So, the twin's birthdays' started out well, and then it all went downhill from there.

We started the day out making number "1" pancakes, which Finley and Scout thoroughly enjoyed! They loved the whip cream on them!







We had plans of just hanging out for the day, and then having a mini birthday party with just the family that night. BUT Finley decided to get sick. When I got him up from his nap I discovered that he had thrown up. There was vomit ALL over his crib. :(

And that was the beginning of a very long week and a half...

He threw up again after supper, and then again while opening their presents, (which happens to be caught on tape...lovely birthday memories huh!)

He did feel good enough for a little while to participate in opening presents.



One of the things we gave the babies was this penquin, and Scout was not so sure what she thought of it.



Finley continued to throw up all through the night, and couldn't keep even the tiniest bit of water down. By 9:30 am on thursday, Thanksgiving Day, he couldn't even hold his little head up he was so weak and dehydrated.

We called the on call Dr. who suggested we bring him in to the E.R. We agreed, and Mama and Finley went while Daddy stayed home with the rest of the kids.

Apparently our Thanksgiving tradition has become going to the E.R. for some reason or another! Last year it was me with dehydration.

When we got to the E.R. the Dr. said right away that he definitely needed fluids. He was like trying to hold an 18 lb. newborn. He couldn't hold his head up, couldn't sit, wouldn't even move on his own. He was just limp. :(

First they did a chest x-ray and took a urine sample, and then they started the IV and took blood. They came back later saying they didn't get enough blood, and had to poke around in 2 more spots to finally get some.

My poor little babe was just limp in my arms all day. We hung out in the E.R. for about 5 hours, just rocking and snuggling.

After 2 units of fluid he was doing a little better as he wasn't throwing up anymore, but was definitely feeling pretty miserable still. The crappy pictures are from my phone.





The Dr. decided he was still too dehydrated, and needed an IV fluid drip overnight, so they admitted him.

Around 3:00 they moved us up to a room in pediatrics. After we got settled in the room, Daddy, Malichi, Kinzie and Scout came to the hospital. We had our Thanksgiving dinner at the hospital from the hospital cafeteria. The food was....not the most edible, and it was far from what we planned on doing for Thanksgiving, But we were together and that was what mattered.













After our "feast" I took the big kids and Scout back to the house, and Mom and Grammy came to stay with them so Aaron and I could be at the hospital with Finner. Scout came back with me to the hospital and stayed the night too. Since they are both still nursing I couldn't leave her home overnight.

The nurse asked me if they could just share a crib for the night! REALLY? First of all no, they don't share a crib...Scout might maul Finley...and second...um he has the stomach FLU! Hello. We brought in a pack-n-play for Scout.

Thursday night Finley's IV came out of his hand, so they had to take it out and they tried to put it back in the same spot, which was a disaster. He started throwing up and they couldn't get it in. So then they put it in his foot, and threw up then too.
Overnight he did pretty good, and had quit throwing up. By friday morning he was wanting to be up and crawling around, but with the IV he couldn't. The Dr. saw us early and we were discharged around 9:30. We took our baby home, and he seemed to be doing so much better! It was so good to see him smiling and crawling around again!

Finley was doing well, so I went out Black friday shopping with my mom while Grammy and Daddy stayed back with the kids.
Saturday Finley did really well too, and was on the mend. The big first birthday party was scheduled for Sunday, and I spend the day saturday preparing for it, baking, making soups, cleaning, and finishing up a birthday present for the twins I was making.

Sunday the party was ON! I was so excited to celebrate with my babies, especially after the few days we'd had prior!

I made giant cupcakes, one for each of them, to dig into, and small cupcakes for the guests instead of cake.










The party was really great! Finley and Scout had a blast digging into their cakes, and opening their gifts!















Late saturday night I finally finished the project I was working on for the twins, so I gave them their gift on Sunday.

They each got their own fabric book; "Who loves Scout?" and "Who loves Finley?". The books have the family, the Grandparents, Great Grandmas, and Aunts, Uncles and Cousins in them.












Sunday night we thought everything was good, and everyone was healthy, until Finley threw up again! Even then we thought maybe it was just too much to handle with all the excitement and too much cake, too soon after being sick.

But we soon realized that was not the case. He threw up again Monday morning, Monday evening, Tuesday morning, and Tuesday night.

Monday we went to the Dr. for the babies' 12 month check ups. We didn't do Finley's shots because he was still so sick, but we did Scouts. She had to get 2 in each leg and 1 in each arm! :( Poor babe!

Finley weighed 18 lbs. 12 oz. (up from 18 lbs 1 oz in the hosptial on Thanksgiving), which put him at 5% for weight. He was 28 1/2" (20%) for height. Scoutie was 22 lbs (70%) for weight, and was 28 1/4" (25%) for height.

After Finley was up for about 2 hours screaming tuesday night and most of wednesday morning, I scheduled a Dr. appt. for noon that day. I was starting to worry that there might be something else wrong besides the stomache flu.

We were on our way to the Dr. when Scout starting throwing up in the car. A lot.

We got to the clinic, and I got Scout cleaned up, and we saw the Dr. She thought Finley was probably having cramps from the flu and that was why he was so fussy. He didn't want to be put down at all and just couldn't be consoled. She gave us zofran for Scoutie's puking and nausea. And just told us to really try to keep her hydrated as much as possible to avoid another E.R. visit!

My mom came up that afternoon to help out. Thank you Mom for coming on such short notice!

Scout puked again after supper on wednesday, so we gave her the zofran. That seemed to help, and she slept pretty good that night. Thursday and Friday she wouldn't nurse or drink anything, and we didn't give her any solids. Finally on friday night we gave her a little toast. She kept that down, but still wouldn't nurse. We gave her medicine syringes full of pedialyte and gatorade to try to keep her hydrated.

By Friday Finley was finally back to his old self, giggling and playing. It took him a few days after the symptoms were gone to really feel good again. This flu has just taken so much out of them.

Saturday afternoon Scout finally started nursing a little, but was pretty lethargic and had not had much wet diapers and wasn't producing tears. We debated bringing her in for IV fluids too, but just kept pushing the fluids through the medicine dropper. Saturday night she nursed a lot so decided to keep her home as long as she was keeping it down. Sunday morning she threw up after breakfast again. She seemed to feel a little better after vomiting. We gave her medicine syringes of pedialyte all day. She slept a lot, and kept down the fluids. By evening she was producing tears and even had a somewhat wet diaper.

The last 5 days poor Scoutie has just been laying around not interested in doing much :(



We are going to take it easy the next couple of days and hopefully she'll be back to her old silly self again soon!

In between all the puking, we did manage to get our tree up this week, which brightened up our lives a little! I just love having the tree up, the house decorated, and listening to Christmas music.



Hopefully we can all stay healthy the rest of the holiday season!

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