I can't speak for Phil, but I slept horribly. I woke up with every beep of David's monitor. I would sleep for maybe 45 minutes at a time. I was just so nervous and worried, and so many other things. I was so thankful to be in a great hospital with sweet nurses who really took care of us.
Around 6 am, we were visited by a group of surgical residents. We were basically told they had David on the list of surgeries for later in the day, but that they were still going over the x-rays from the procedure they did the night before. It wasn't a guarantee that David would have surgery, but he was on the list just in case. {We were told later that, of the 10 children admitted to the hospital the same night, 7 of them were appendicitis!}
After getting some breakfast, Phil and I agreed that it was ok for him to go to work for a bit. If David needed surgery, we needed him to work and make some money to pay the bills! My FIL Jim stayed with me for part of the day, and my MIL Darla stayed with Jillian at home. I don't think Jillian had her normal preschool class that day or not, but she was in good hands regardless. {Side note: I know my parents would have given anything to be there with us. With it being so close to Christmas and the winter weather up in Wisconsin, they just had no way of getting here. Their support, even from 800 miles away, was felt, and I'm so thankful to have them as my parents!} David's fever was finally coming down a little, but he was not eating anything. He was hooked to an IV and that's about all he could muster. He slept most of the day. Even if I talked to him, he didn't really want to sit up. I don't know how other parents do the hospital thing day in and day out. I was afraid to use the bathroom just in case something happened!
At one point that afternoon, we had another doctor come in and say that they are pretty confident the procedure they did before worked, but they wanted to leave him on the surgery list just in case. Plus, they wanted him to be able to eat and keep things down before they discharged him. This all made sense to me, and I was only slightly relieved. Knowing he was on the surgery list "just in case" made me think he still needed surgery. That night, Phil's folks left to head home, so Phil stayed with Jillian at our house. It was another long night for me, but we made it through.
The next day, we had a few visitors! Phil took the day off of work to help with Jillian, but they came up for a little while. We had about 3 visitors from church come over and check in on us, which was so nice! Plus, one of them works at that hospital, and she was able to get someone in to explain the situation a little more with us. That doctor told us that they no longer had David on the surgery list, and at this point, he just needed to keep food and liquids down for a few hours before they felt comfortable discharging him. I started giving him plain Pedialyte, and ordered a breakfast tray with scrambled eggs for him. He ate pretty well, and seemed to perk up once he got some food! His fever was all but gone too. I was so glad to finally relax about the whole situation. He got checked over, and we were told we could go home that evening.
So to make a long story somewhat short: David had a really bad stomach virus. This virus caused his intestines to fold in on themselves, causing his intense abdominal pain and fever. They were not folded up enough to warrant surgery to repair it, and it was mild enough that it took us a few days to figure it out. The enemas they did allowed his intestines to go back in place. He then needed to eat, drink, and poop normally before he could leave the hospital. By that point, his fever had gone down too.
I had no idea this could even happen to anybody, let alone my baby! It is common in babies, and especially boys. It can happen to girls or even adults, but that is rare. I could never say thank you enough to all of the hospital workers, doctors, nurses, family, friends, church family, and prayer partners for all the help and support we were shown. It was a scary situation, and I know God sent his helpers to us. God is so good!
I hope we don't have to be at the hospital again for a long time!
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