Doctors, Dentists, and Doctors

Last week was a week full of needles for our whole family.  On Monday I had my 'baby checkup" and glaucoma blood draw.  I may have mentioned this before but the wonderful lady, April, that does blood draws in my OB's office is simply amazing.  I hardly feel it and she make me laugh every time.  (I hate needles and blood).  Oh I'm 30 weeks!  I meant to do better about getting pictures but to be honest life has been to crazy for me to even get a snap shot.
On Tuesday Evanicio had to go have a tooth extracted.  (Cavity turned root canal, turned extraction implant, poor Evan!)  They had to do a blood draw on him that day as well.  Unlucky for him they were fairly old school in their blood draw methods and it hurt!  Poor Guy!

We then had a few days off so Evanicio could heal.  Mikey and I took advantage of the nice weather and played outside with friends. 
Take a look at all those orange Crocs!  The weather has been the standard 60's and rainy June so it was nice to have a sunny day!
On Friday our whole family got up early and headed to Mary Bridge Children's hospital in Tacoma.  Mikey had to have a "clinical clean out" which required him to have a tube down his nose to his tummy (Pumping in over a gallon of 'Go lightly" meds), an IV, and enema's. He had to be awake and moving as much as possible, so an adult (Evan or I) had to be with him at all times. We arrived at 8:00am and were told that we hopefully could leave by 4:00 or earlier.  
Lets just say from the moment we arrived Mikey was not happy (he knew we were at the doctors and he wanted to go home.)  He did great for the X-ray, yelled at the nurse when she had to put the tube in, was raging mad when we did the first enema, and then after the IV he "shut down".  It was so hard for me.  He wouldn't look at Evanicio or I or talk to anyone.  He would just stare off.  I knew it was his way of dealing with a situation he was not happy to be in but as a mom it broke my heart.  This is a picture of him during that time.  (Not or normal happy smiling kid.)

 He couldn't eat anything but Popsicles which he didn't want, was constantly cold (because of the fluid being pumped into him), didn't want to walk around, and didn't want to go potty which resulted in his tummy becoming huge and bloated from all the medicine being pumped into it.  By about 2 in the afternoon, Mikey was done.  He wouldn't let us touch him to take him out of the bed, he was shivering and his eyes kept closing.  The nurse finally told us to let him sleep.  So we did for about 30 minutes.  When he woke up he was whinning.  So I carried him to the potty where he finally went potty YAY but then threw up tons because his belly was just too full of liquid.  It was scary for Mikey and Mommy at that point.  We then tried to get him to walk again but he was so weak it was hard and they increased the medicine going in because we were running out of time to get him cleaned out, which resulted in him throwing up again.  I then begged Mikey to walk around the hall with Evanicio and I.  He was shivering and upset about being forced to walk (he was connected to tubes and we had to wheel his "truck" as he called it around with him as we walked.)  The nurses had hid pictures we had to find and then take them back to a certain spot in the hall.  Initially we only made him walk to do this but by 4:00 Evan and I were forcing him to run.  I felt bad but we didn't want to stay in the hospital over night which is what we would have had to do if he wouldn't go potty.
Finally after all that running, I took him to the potty and him and I blew whistles and thank goodness we finally saw the blue medicine that they had been pumping into him all day coming out (this is what we had been waiting for.)  We then had another x-ray, which Evanicio and I thought wasn't going to be good enough but in the end they let us go home! (It was a little after 5:00 at this point.)
It was amazing how quickly Mikey returned to his old self once the nurse took the tube and IV off of him.  All the sudden he went from this sad, quite, angry kid to his talkative jumping self.  What joy we all felt to see the little man we all know back! 
He was telling everyone there thank you and giving everyone hugs and kisses and informing them "I get to go HOME!"
Once we were in the car he told me "Mamai I'm SO HUNGRY."  I didn't want to go out to eat because he needed something gentle on his stomach, but we still had a 45 minute drive to get home.  So I handed him a nectarine, he has never eaten a whole one (I usually cut them up) so I wasn't sure what he would do but he went to town!
He was so happy to be headed home and able to eat! 
The entire experience made me really feel for parents whose child has to be in the hospital for days-weeks-months.  Our situation wasn't even life threatening and it caused me stress so I can only imagine how stressful it is on parents that have to watch their child day after day hooked to tubes. What strength they must have or need in those moments. 
We have a follow up for Mikey in one month to see if his intestine stays clear and healthy if not we will have more tests run and who knows what else to figure out why his digestion is not working well.