Jasmine Stalker-Firth

Jasmine has had a rotten cold. One that was proving very difficult to shift. She has had it for about two weeks now and it was probably the reason why she needed her NG tube.

I thought she was getting better, but on Friday she was really tired and wimpering for most of the day which is unusual for her. In the morning her temperature, blood pressure and weight were fine. But something wasn’t right. At first I thought it was a combination of the cold and teething so, for the first time, I gave her some paracetamol to take away some of the symptoms and make her snooze a little.

It didn’t work. She continued whimpering away and by mid-afternoon was vomiting and pooing more than usual too. Around 5pm, when I changed her out of yet more sicky clothes, her legs were all deep purple and mottled. Neil took her temperature – it was 38.6 – and then her breathing became laboured and her eyes were rolling back in her head. We rang the hospital, and took Jasmine’s blood pressure whilst we were talking to them, and then we ran straight down there, getting lots of water down her, as we were told. Squashing on the tube in rush hour with a buggy isn’t easy but it is amazing what you can do when you must.

We got there and almost on arrival Jasmine looked a lot better. The nurses said that this often happens. The mottled purple on her legs (a fever rash) had faded and her breathing was a lot better. They ran some tests: bloods and PD specimen. And everything came back fine. But the doctor wasn’t taking any chances and kept Jasmine in overnight. She was kept off dialysis for the night too to give her a chance to gain some fluid, as she was looking decidedly dehydrated at this point.

So they think that the combination of a bad cold, teething, losing a lot of fluid through vomiting and pooing, and coming off her dialysis a bit dehydrated that morning, had led to Jasmine spiking a fever.

I was very sad at leaving my baby on the ward even though the nurses are brilliant and would watch her all night. Neil and I kissed her goodnight and went out for something to eat but we were so tired after all the panic that we got home as soon as we could for a hot bath and bed. That night in bed, without the machine pumping and buzzing, it was difficult to get to sleep, and we lay in bed chatting about how comforting we find the noise of the dialysis machine.

I woke early and lay waiting in bed until I gave up and rang the ward at 6am to ask how Jasmine was. The nurse who answered said that she was fine and told me to listen as she held out the phone. My baby girl was singing quite loudly across the ward and had been doing so for a good hour.

We got down there at 9am and Jasmine was sitting in her buggy by the nurses’ station and when she saw us she burst into tears. We picked her up and made a big fuss of her, until the doctor came in and said that Jasmine was fine and we could all go home.

When we got back, Jasmine had a parcel from her Grandma and Grandad Stalker with two really cute outfits in. Neil insisted that I took a picture this morning, as she looks like a bobby dazzler in her new suit and like a totally different baby to the one we had to rush off to hospital on Friday.

We are still really tired, and are taking it in turns to snooze round the flat. Neil was asleep on the chaise longue until I took this picture and Jasmine was snoozing in her cot, but now she has woken up and is burbling away to herself. All day yesterday, because she was so thirsty we fed her using the cup, but we are leaving the NG in for now, until she has properly recovered. But she was funny this morning as she cried out loud everytime Neil tried to connect her to the food pump so in the end we just fed her from the cup. She still won’t eat any solids though.

Today, we are staying indoors as it has been freezing. It was snowing last night and it had laid this morning. Now it is pouring down and is really dark outside. But who cares about outside, today we are thrilled and are giving thanks to be back at home with our gorgeous girl. There is nowhere else we would rather be.

This entry was posted on Sunday, November 23rd, 2008 at 11:38 am and is filed under home. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.