Last weekend we tried to kick the season off right by catching the Raleigh Christmas Parade with our friends Luke and Katie and their two boys. Things started out well enough. We picked up Munchkins from Dunkin Donuts (a rare treat for all), and Katie nibbled on several "chocowat ones" on our way downtown. The parade weather was frigid, but Katie and Luke found a great spot on Salisbury Street where we could easily see the action.
Toward the end of the parade, our Katie started acting a little off, and had to go potty so we left before the Big Guy made his appearance. We got home just in time to see the entire State-UNC game (which coincided with Katie's nap-time, so I had to tone down my celebrations in the second half). By the way, if you didn't hear, State won convincingly 41-10 at Chapel Hill.
Everything seemed fine Saturday and most of Sunday. On Sunday, Katie had a bit of a fever that came and went, but we kept giving her Motrin and the fever would die down and she'd sleep. With Maggie squared away for the night and Katie semi-comfortable on the couch, Karla and I let down our guard and enjoyed a couple of glasses of wine Sunday night.
Around 9 PM, Katie roused briefly from her sleep. She had been awake and talking not a half hour before. This time, her eyes would not focus, and she just lay there on our couch, unresponsive. Karla and I both tried shaking her to no avail. I went to get some decent clothes on to throw everyone in the car and head to the ER. By the time I got back into the living room, Katie's eyes were staring blankly and she began to convulse. Not knowing what to do, I told Karla to try to splash her with water, then to actually try to get her in a tub to cool her down. I called 911.
Realizing the tub wasn't working and might actually be making things worse, we got her out and put her on the living room floor on her side. After what seemed like an eternity, she stopped convulsing just as the EMTs arrived. Karla rode with Katie in the ambulance and I gathered Maggie and followed them to the hospital. Karla told me later that Katie's temperature spiked at 105.7 and she began to seize again in the ambulance just as they arrived at the children's ER.
I got into the lobby as quickly as I could and mustered the explanation "my little girl just came in by ambulance". I was given a sticker and went through the doors in time to see them bringing Katie into a room. She was stripped down to her Dora the Explorer underwear, blood was taken, catheter inserted, and she was hooked up to an IV. At this point, she was coherent enough to feel pain and broke both our hearts screaming "it hurts" over and over again.
Finally she was stabilized, given more Motrin, and fell asleep. Her fever broke a little while later, and we were discharged without much fanfare at around 2:30AM. Diagnosis: simple febrile seizure. Apparently no big deal, the ER doc said she sees about one case per shift. As Karla brought Katie out of the ER, she (always the social butterfly) waved and said "bye bye peoples" to the ER staff. As they came to the drop off area, Katie's puffy eyes lit up and I could hear her shouting "it's daddy!". No big deal, indeed.
After a late night stop at the only grocery open in our area, we got home about 4:30. The girls were tucked in, and Karla and I fell out. I left a (I am sure) delirious message for my legal assistant that I would not be coming in on Monday. I mustered enough energy to pull almost a full day Tuesday (though one coworker told me later I looked like a zombie). Wednesday I left at 1PM with two briefcases full of work I barely touched over the next 4 days...
Thursday Katie was feeling better enough to make the trip to Greensboro to have Thanksgiving with Granny, Aunt Myra, Uncle Roger, cousin Sean and mom. We stuck around long enough to say hi to the rest of the Williams clan. You would never know she had been sick a day in her life, the way she acted on Thanksgiving.
The rest of the week went by in a blur of what is becoming life's normal rhythm of having two kids. Feed them, change them or escort them to the potty, let them nap, try to rest or do something for yourself for an hour, feed them, etc. Oh, State won again on Saturday so we may actually go bowling this winter.
Karla and I frankly haven't even had time to sit and talk to each other about what is probably to this point the scariest experience in each of our lives. We slogged through the next couple of days of "vacation" and sit here at the point of departure where I return to work, Katie goes back to preschool, and everything gets back to "normal", whatever that is. I think we get through it by amnesia. The same kind of wonderful amnesia that makes women forget how painful it is to have a child and decide to have another...
Strange as it seems, the one thing I clearly do remember about this whole ordeal is having dinner with just Karla and the girls at Chick-fil-A Monday night after the ER trip. Katie had gone "poopoo in the potty", so we told her she could have a milkshake. She wanted a peppermint milkshake, so it was off to Chick-fil-A. A nice, normal, American family fast-food dinner. Chick-fil-A was decorated for Christmas, and Christmas tunes played just loud enough to notice. The staff was super friendly and helped us to our seats. Katie ate her chicken and waffle fries like she was famished and even thought barbecue sauce was "nummy". She was so good she got to play in the play area with some big kids before getting her milkshake, which had to have given her brain freeze she drank it so fast.
It seems lame, a revelation of sorts at the Chick-fil-A. But I felt a peace I haven't felt in a while just watching my child eat, drink, smile, talk and play. Watching my baby lay there peacefully asleep in her carseat. Looking my wonderful, beautiful wife in her weary eyes, seeing her joy at watching our little girl be healthy again. Knowing that, at the end of the day, those three girls are my life. And if they are there with me, smiling, eating, sleeping, talking, pooping, breathing, then everything is normal.
