Gastro Drama

It was another very early morning for me - up since 3:00am for the second day in a row.  This time it was because Peyton had slept the entire day (Monday) and decided to go insane at about 3:00am Tuesday morning.  First off, she woke up really fussing, which worried me.  She was drenched in sweat but she was hot.  I thought initially the fever had broken, but instead, her temp was 102.7!!  I gave her some Tylenol.  Shortly thereafter, the fever must have broken because she went from fussy child to crazy active child, rolling all over her crib flipping herself from one end to the other.  That was it, we were up for the day.

It was a crazy day of phone calls and chatting online about her status - enough that it make me forget to pick Moira up at school!!  Ok, so I knew I had to - it just didn't occur to me to check the time while I was busy!  I happened to glance at the clock on my computer and it was 9 minutes past dismissal time.  Good thing we live close!  I was out the door so fast, I nearly ran over the 2 home nurses who were just coming in to draw labs from Peyton!  That would be me personally, not me with the car!!  So, I made it to the school and sped through the pick up line - not a single car was ahead of me.  Imagine that!  Actually, if I leave right AT dismissal time from home, I can make it and be within the last 10 or so cars to go through, which is ok.  I guess those few minutes make all the difference.  Frankly, I was stunned the line moved that fast!  At least there were still cars within a few feet of the school property, so it's not I abandoned her.  Poor kid!!

So what made my day so crazy??  Phone calls.  Non-stop phone calls!

First off, the endoscopy coordinator who I spoke with yesterday called me early this morning to check on Peyton's status - when was her last fever, what was it, what was her temp now, how is she doing, etc.  We discussed the issues of anesthesia being the potential snag in the plan to get the bronchoscopy and endoscopy done this week.   Given that she did have a 102+ fever overnight, it was really cutting it close.  She said sometimes they like to wait 2 weeks after a fever, but with Peyton's general health, if you wait for the "right" time, you'll never find it - and if you schedule something for when you *think* the right time will be, surely you'll wind up rescheduling, just as I have done with her sleep study, which is in it's 3rd or 4th rescheduling, currently set for 1/30/11.  I explained how Peyton wound up hospitalized due to illness days prior to her salivary gland surgery and that they kept it on the schedule in the hopes she'd be well enough.  She had a fever then and the surgery was fairly close to 24 hours after the fever broke, if that.  She took that into consideration so she could let the anesthesia team know, as there would be reports in the system on how well she did under those conditions.

Later in the day, I received a call from the pulmonary clinic.  It was the nurse practitioner who I'm always talking with.  She wanted to give me a heads up as to what was going on because apparently this whole endoscopy/bronchoscopy thing has caused quite the drama between pulmonary and gastroenterology.  I just field calls and do what they tell me - no drama here.  Not there, apparently.  I'll spare you all the details, as I could go on for about an hour about that.  Suffice it to say, a note is in the system from anesthesia from today stating that they are ok with proceeding with the procedure tomorrow (Wednesday).  The GI doctor wanted labs drawn, so that was the reason for the home nurses coming as I was heading out the door.  There was more drama around that between that agency and the hospital (because of failure to communicate WHEN the procedure would be), but long story short, they were drawing labs this afternoon.

So, the bronchoscopy and endoscopy have been coordinated between the pulmonary doctor and the GI doctor.  Peyton and I have to be there at 7:00 in the morning and she is the first one on the schedule.  Aside from looking for a potential cause for the gastric bleeding, they'll be able to get down in her lungs, get samples and maybe try to figure out what's keeping Peyton so sick this past year.  As much as I don't want them to find anything wrong at all, I would love to get some answers so we can work on a solution, assuming there is one. 

Please send up some prayers for Peyton for this procedure to go well and for us to hopefully find some answers. Thanks!  Will update tomorrow.