Brigham's Surgery

During Christmas Vacation this year we had a bit of excitement and spent a little too much time in the emergency room. The day after we got to Tracy Joseph had a BAD case of the flu and kept us up all night cleaning up vomit and busy all the next day washing laundry and cleaning carpets, couches, and even Ben's laptop. Joe threw up one time too many and we were worried that he would get dehydrated because he couldn't keep anything down, so exhausted as we were, we headed to the hospital. Brigham also had a bad cough, so we decided to bring him as long as we were already going to be sitting around the Emergency Department. (You can sit there for hours until you actually see a doctor.) We were lucky that the ER was not busy and they let both of our boys be seen at the same time. Joey got a shot that would keep him from getting nauseated so he would not throw up anymore. I didn't even know such things existed, but he did not get sick anymore. Brigham's "cough" was strange. I couldn't figure out what it was. At first I thought it was from a cold he had, but it lasted 2-3 weeks. He didn't show other symptoms of a cold anymore and it mostly only happened when he was crying. It was a wheezing, sucking sound when he breathed in hard. I almost thought it could be asthma, because Ben used to have asthma and the air quality down in Fresno is not very good. The doctors thought it could be bronchitis, but they were going to do an x-ray to check for pneumonia. We were all shocked when the x-ray came back. His lungs were fine, but there was a coin caught in his esophagus! The doctors were surprised because of how long it had been in there. They said since it was not going to pass through on its own, they would have to send him to Children's Hospital in Oakland to have it removed. They had to send him by ambulence. Ben didn't want to ride in the Ambulence, so he drove our car and I rode with Brigham. With all the waiting we did, it was a long night. When we got to Oakland, they wanted to take their own x-rays even though the doctor in Tracy sent theirs. The coin was still there (not a big surprise for those of us who knew it had been there for a couple weeks), and they decided to have us wait until morning when the surgery could be performed by a regular surgeon rather than the ER one. It was 4:30 am by the time we got to go to sleep. The hardest part was getting Brigham to go to sleep without nursing him. I don't think he ever would have survived if he wouldn't take a pacifier. It was hard to watch them put an IV in his little hand (several times), but it helped knowing he was recieving nourishment even though I could not feed him. We got to sleep until 7. As far as the surgery... it went well. They put him to sleep, reached down his throat and pulled out a slimey corroding penny that had obvoiusly been there a while. It did not take long at all and Brigham was so much happier afterward! They made us wait around 3 or 4 hours just to make sure he was going to be okay, but we made it home in time to celebrate Christmas with the Nichols.Just before Surgery
After the Surgery
This dinosaur was made out of cast material
You probably can't see this wall mural very well, but it was of Oakland.

I was so tired! We shared a room with a girl who had swallowed a hair clip that she was playing with in her mouth. She had to stay longer than we did because the clip broke in her throat and they didn't get it all out. We ran into her family again at Target in Tracy.

This whole experience made me appreciate how fragile and precious life is. It was hard watching my baby sleep after the surgery. I felt like a horrible mom because I had no idea he had even swallowed the penny and it was stuck so long. We've been a lot more dilligent in keeping things off the floor since then!