Hospital Stay

It's been quite a week. Well, I suppose it actually started two weeks ago. Superbowl Sunday to be exact. Erik woke up with a fever and was really cranky. After two dayswith a fever and lots of crying, for the first time as a mother I had to deal with an ear infection (I was happy to have avoided it for so long). So after a week of staying indoors and listening to Erik cry a whole lot, he started to get a little better.

And then Melanie got a fever.

It wasn't as high as Erik's, but I knew that it was her turn with the crummies. So she was cranky and didn't really want to eat too much all Monday and Tuesday. I wasn't really too concerned since Erik had just had it. On Wednesday morning at about 2 a.m Melanie woke up crying hysterically. She wouldn't nurse, didn't want her pacifier, and after an hour of her screaming in pain Kent woke up thinking that she might have an ear infection like Erik. But his ear-light-scope-thingy wasn't charged, so he couldn't check. She was also breathing hard since she was all stuffy, so he decided to go ahead and take her to the E.R. And she was admitted that morning. Her oxygen levels were low, she was absolutely miserable, and she wasn't keeping anything down.

And this is where we stayed for 2 1/2 days.

The poor little thing. It took them about 45 minutes to get her IV in. With all that fat it was hard for them to find a good vein, and the one that they did find was in the bend of her arm (or, as Kent would say, the "antecubital fossa") so they had to board her arm to keep it straight. She had bruises and pokes all over her arm from them looking for a good one.

On Thursday they found out that one of the cultures they took was positive for RSV. So she ended up with RSV and viral pneumonia. So we just waited it out until she didn't need oxygen, stopped wheezing, and kept her food down.

The boys colored pictures for her and put them up around her bed. These two are Erik's.

And this one is Taylor's. It's a picture of the hospital. See all 5 of us? For some reason it won't rotate.

Meanwhile, Kent was able to have his schedule cleared so that he could stay home with the boys (thank goodness). So he was busy holding down the fort. Apparently this is what happens when you let two boys watch Peter Pan and then let them jump off the couch next to the blind cords-

Nice rope burn, eh?

We're home now, and aside from a nasty cough and the slight sniffles, she's doing much better.

Although I was not happy in the slightest that she was in the hospital, I have to admit it was lovely to have an excuse to hold my baby all day long. It was so wonderfully quiet, I got so much reading done, and I didn't have to worry about dinner. Oh. And I got a break from my two rambunctious boys. Does that make me a bad mom? I figure I'm still a half-way decent mom since I did start to miss them.