I apologise that I have been remiss of late in keeping this blog up to date but I will endeavour to explain why below.
Last Friday I was designated the duty of driving my parents and older son Monkey Boy to Heathrow so that they could return to their home in a tinpot dictatorship and allow Mrs Bunny Chow and I to try get some level of order back into our lives following the arrival of our younger son now christened The Bug in reference to his resemblance to an angry woodlouse. (I do love my kids but find their ever changing appearance endlessly amusing)
As is often the case of a Friday afternoon or any other afternoon for that matter the M25 was gridlocked and I found myself humming Chris Rea's The Road to Hell and setting out after the two and a half hour journey to Heathrow with a fractious toddler and a feeling of dread. Mrs Bunny Chow called several times to let me know that The Bug had a really high temperature and that she thought we should take him to hospital to be checked out (he was 22 days old at this point) although slow the return journey was much better than the outward one and I was able to make it back to the M23 within an hour which should have seen me within 30 minutes of home.
Annoyingly though as soon as I pulled off the M25 the traffic ground to an inexplicable halt, literally going from 70ish MPH to zero, if the traffic reports had made any mention of this I could have driven on to the next junction and around the problem but of course they hadn't and I was now stuck with an extremely fractious, hungry and screaming toddler and a wife who was becoming understandably anxious on the end of the phone. Despite that fact that I was now only a few miles from home, I could see that we were stuck for the long hall and suggested to Mrs Bunny Chow that an ambulance was summonsed to come to her and I rummaged around to find snack goods to sooth Monkey Boy.
Mrs Bunny Chow and The Bug were ferried to A&E at Croydon University Hospital with my journey taking much longer and no explanation as to why it took an hour and a half or so to drive the length of the M23 before it cleared to relatively empty smooth roads. I of course observed all speed limits and drove as only an Audi driver can with extreme patience and courtesy to the hospital to meet up with my sick child and beloved wife.
On arrival at the hospital it became apparent that A&E was business as usual and despite having been there for some time and being brought in by ambulance Mrs Bunny Chow had seen no one but a Triage Nurse and we were in for the long hall wait. Our dear friend Mrs T (thank you) kindly agreed to come to our home to babysit the now sleeping older child so I was sent to take him home to his bed returning to hurry up and wait.
Eventually things started happening with various worried looking doctor types arriving and prodding The Bug and it was decided that he was indeed a very sick little boy although they did not know what was making him ill so they would need to conduct various tests to establish what was wrong whilst agreeing that until then it was best to get him started on intravenous antibiotics and fluids. The exams included conducting a lumbar puncture to extract a spinal fluid sample, a Chest X-Ray as well as blood and urine samples. I watched the Lumbar puncture take place against the advice of the doctors and was very proud not to faint and only felt a little queasy, in all honesty although it was a touch distressing to see my little boy in such an unnatural setting I found the procedure fascinating.
I eventually went home leaving Mrs Bunny Chow and The Bug at about 4am knowing that I would have to be up early to deal with older child and also to relieve the duties of the wonderful and lovely Mrs T (thank you again we owe you one or several) Mrs Bunny Chow tells me that after the chest X-Ray they were taken to the Rupert Bear Ward and checked into an individual room with still no one any the wiser as to what might be wrong with the little man.
The following day I was stuck at home with older child whilst Mrs Bunny Chow and The Bug had to endure lots of hurrying up and waiting for doctors to come with little or no news and The Bug continued to supper from discomfort and high temperatures. That afternoon I managed to arrange with another friend who we'll refer to as The Kiwi (thank you too) to babysit older child so that I could get to the hospital and support the exhausted Mrs Bunny Chow, the doctors had at this point let her know that they had not managed to track down the source of The Bug's illness and as some of the symptoms he was presenting were consistent with Meningitis they were going to do a second Lumbar Puncture as there had been blood present in his first sample they had been unable to rule this out.
Still the test continued to come in with no conclusive results not really showing anything other than that the little mans white blood cell count was up and he was fighting off a massive infection of some sort whether it was viral or bacterial though they were unable to say. I sent Mrs Bunny Chow home so that she could try and have a decent night or at least some rest.
Sunday came and went with little change other than myself and Mrs Bunny Chow swapping places again and more tutting and confused doctors, they must have been doing something right though as The Bug began feeding again and his drip was removed in the wee hours of Monday morning retaining only his cannula in place for the IV antibiotics to continue.
We swapped places again on Monday evening by which stage he was looking better and better with his temperature coming down to relatively normal levels and demands for food rising in tempo and pitch.
I stayed with him again through Tuesday and Tuesday night and he was eventually released on Wednesday lunchtime following five days of antibiotics and no one having any real clue as to why he ended up where he did.
Before I go though we'd like to once again thank our friends and family for all their support in this difficult time especially the wonderfully kind Mrs T and The Kiwi we honestly don't know what we would have done without you. Chuckles your support and kind words were also a great help as were the wonderful and lovely messages we received through face book and twitter. We Love you all.
We would also like to express our sincere thanks to the staff of Croydon University Hospital and the Rupert Bear Ward, yes it was a hospital stay which is never pleasant but the ending was a happy one and with a few minor exceptions you were kind patient and healed our Bug.
I hope that none of you readers never have to experience what we have just been through but rest assured that even when things look grim there is not always a sad ending.
thank you for reading, normal grumpy service will resume with my next post
TTFN
Mr Bunny Chow
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