Jack and Katrina's Place

As alluded to in the previous post we had a bit of a stressful weekend. Guy came home from school on Thursday feeling unwell, head aching, aching joints, good old winter flu symptoms. Friday the school was closed for scheduling reasons, so he stayed home with Katrina, having a sofa bed and playing computer games as he was still not feeling flash. By the time I got home on friday night he was very pale, very hot 39.8, and had sore eyes. Thinking it was a bad flu and seeking to relieve his misery for the weekend we went down to the after hours pharmacy. They looked at him straight  away and discovered a rash appearing on his back. Within 30 minutes we were sent up to the Accident and Emergency department at Wellington Hopsital and 30 minutes after that he was in a A&E ward having blood taken and being monitored for suspected Menigitis. Very Scary for us but Guy was a little solider, very stoic even when they had two attempts to get a line into his arm.
While this was going on I was sitting in the carpark with a sleeping William who thankfully decided to stretch out to a 4 hour stint between feeds. By 9pm he was stirring so I swapped over with Kat and she took William home while I setttled in for a night in A&E. By 2am they had  a room for us in the Childrens hopsital so up we went. Then they decided they needed a lumbar puncture to check for menigicoccal menigitis. Unfortunately A&E had applied the anethising gel in the wrong place, and at 3am the duty registra had three unsuccsessful attempts to insert the needle into guys spinal column. Traumatic for everyone, and I still don't think it was good decision making to attempt it a 3am on sleeping child with a doctor who'd been on duty all night, it really was the stuff nightmares are made of.

By Saturday morning when Katrina came down with an overnight bag for us both (I was still in my friday work clothes) Guy had responded to the IV anti-biotics and was noticelably brighter. Unfortunately they still needed some spinal fluid but in the daylight the new doctor acheived it with less drama. After the puncture procedure they found the traditional lemondade popsical which Guy enjoyed (althought the punctrue and lines in his arms made it hard to hold). Katrina's new tablet proved its worth as we spent a rainy winters afternoon playing 'Angry Birds in Space'. Guy would play a few levels until he got stuck and then pass it to me. Weird but strangely fascinating game.

By Sunday morning they found there was no infection in the spinal fluid and Guy had responded well to the anti-biotics so home we came by 2pm on Sunday afternoon. Not the way we'd have chosen to spend the weekend but so glad we live in a country with hospitals and trained people. At 3pm Sunday I sat down to contemplate this with cup of tea, and 40 winks later my kind wife recorded the scene!