Thankful Thursday

(I am writing this blog while at the hospital Thursday afternoon, although I’m not sure when it will be posted since the network here in currently down.)

Early this morning my 8-month old baby girl had surgery on an abscess in her neck. I am very thankful that she is doing well and is resting now.

Since I’m sure that’s not enough information, let me give you the whole story….

Midweek last week we noticed Reagan seemed pretty fussy for no apparent reason and would cry especially when we picked her up. She would also randomly burst out crying while eating or being held, which is exceptionally strange for her. She is a very happy baby.

On Monday morning, I decided to take her to see the doctor. I figured she had an ear infection or something since I had not noticed anything different about her appearance. The doctor checked her mouth, eyes, ears, and then turned her head to the side and asked, “What about this?”

**Bad mom moment!**

There was a very large lump on the side of my daughter’s neck. The doctor said it looked like an infected lymph node and ordered antibiotics to be started. She told me to come back on Wednesday for Reagan to be rechecked and I headed home, medicine in hand.

On Tuesday afternoon I noticed that the lump had dropped a bit lower on her neck and had turned redder. The doctor had not told me to bring her in if it changed in color or location – only if it got bigger. I figured it could wait til the next morning.

When I got the doctor’s office on Wednesday, I was pretty sure I should have brought her in the day before. The lump was still getting redder and had moved even further down her neck.
I waited for the doctor and when he arrived one of the first questions he asked me was, “Have you been out of the country lately?”

*Gulp*

That’s never the question you want to hear at the doctor’s office. Since we had not made any elaborate trips to Paris or Cancun, he said he would bring in another doctor to look at her. They both squished the lump on her neck. She was not happy. They decided to call the ENT doctor (ear, nose, and throat), who proceeded to have me come in that afternoon.

He looked at her neck and squished it. By now, Reagan was getting pretty tired of seeing new faces. By the time the next ENT doctor came in (to get a 2nd opinion…or really a 4th opinion), she was crying. She was not interested in seeing any more new people. Nevertheless, he squished her neck too. They agreed that she should have a CAT scan.

“It feels very firm, so it’s pretty unlikely that there is any fluid in there but if there is it will need to be drained as soon as possible,” he told me. I asked him about a million questions before concurring that this was probably a necessary thing.

My husband joined us at the hospital for the CAT scan. Watching my 8-month old baby get an IV put in her arm was not exactly what I had planned for my Wednesday afternoon, but…well, it had to be done. She did well for the CAT scan. Well, okay, she actually screamed the whole time. But she sat still enough that we did not need to repeat the process.

Of course nobody in radiation could tell us anything. They sent us back to the ENT doctor. We waited and waited until everyone else had gone. Finally the nurse brought us back to the exam room. The doctor came in a few minutes later and said nonchalantly, “Yep, there’s a bunch of fluid in there, so she’s going to need to have surgery.”

Well that’s fine, doc….but couldn’t you find a more…I don’t know…roundabout way of saying it instead of just blurting it out?

He sent us to the hospital, where our baby girl was given a new IV, this one in her head. Although she looked terrible, we agreed that it was probably the best place for us since she would be less likely to pull on the cord and the nurse had informed us that there are fewer nerve endings up there anyway. We spent the night and she was whisked off to surgery at exactly 7am.
Less than 45 minutes later, the doctor came to the waiting room to tell us that the surgery was over and that she was doing well. We were able to see her a few minutes later. She was extremely crabby. But having just woken up from anesthesia, I couldn’t really blame her.

The doctors tell us she is doing well and that we should be out of the hospital by Saturday. They do not know yet what caused the infection (or even if it really was an infection), but it’s draining now and that’s the main thing. They are running tests on the fluid to see if they can determine what caused it, but they sound uncertain as to whether or not the tests will yield any true results since Reagan had already been on antibiotics for 2 days prior to the surgery.

At any rate, she seems to be somewhat back to her normal self, and we’re happy about that.
Praise the Lord for His never ending faithfulness!

UPDATE: This morning (Friday) we are awaiting a visit from another ENT doctor. We expect to be here until at least tomorrow morning.