Nightmare

It was Wednesday morning and we were driving Little Husband to Houston for a surgery consultation. I was nervous about this trip because he would have to be sedated for his echocardiogram. He had been sedated one week prior during a surgery consult in Dallas, and my gut instinct told me it wasn’t a good idea to sedate him a second time so soon. Sedating an infant is pretty hard-core: the sedative is given orally and tastes terrible, it takes the rest of the day for it to wear off, and the baby reverts to infant-like behavior such as kittenish crying and no muscle control. Not an easy thing for a parent to witness.

Little Husband screamed when he’d been given the sedative in Dallas. Plus, for some reason he didn’t fall asleep right away like most infants do. In fact, it took him 20-30 minutes to fall asleep and even then he woke up after only 20 minutes (he should have been asleep for an hour). I guess our little guy wanted to show us who was really in charge.

He did just that in Houston.

We arrived for the consult on time and were led back to the room where they sedate him. The nurse weighed him and performed the calculations that determined how much sedative Little Husband would be given. I mentioned how he failed to fall asleep in Dallas. I immediately regretted telling her that fearing that she’d give him a little extra, “just in case”.

Just like the first time, Little Husband screamed bloody murder when he tasted the sedative. The nurse and I took turns trying to calm him and 15 minutes later he was finally in a light sleep. We took him to the echocardiogram room where they hooked him up to a monitor and began tracing his tiny chest with their sonogram probe.

15 – 20 minutes into the test, just as the ultrasound tech was tracing the wand around his stomach, Little Husband began to stir and cry out. Husband comforted him. Then the baby started to cry a little more and we noticed his blood-oxygen level start dropping. It went from being in the high nineties to the eighties. Then the seventies. Then the sixties. Ignorantly, I had no idea what level was considered alarming (anything below 85, as it turns out). As the oxygen left his blood, Little Husband became more and more agitated and was kicking and flailing. The nurse, obviously out of more creative ideas, demonstrated her finely tuned understanding of inconsolable babies: she attempted to restrain him by holding his legs down. Little Husband freaked out. They stopped the ultrasound so that we could work on calming him as this was the best way to raise his 02 level. His crying got worse as did his oxygen levels. I remember looking at the monitor at one point and his blood-oxygen (02) level was in the 30’s. I got up on the table to hold him; he was inconsolable. I tried to breast feed him because he had to fast for four hours prior to the echo and I thought he might be hungry. He wanted no part of it. The nurse placed oxygen tubes in his nose but his 02 level would not rise above the 50’s or 60’s. Finally realizing that things were spinning out of control, the nurse called for the cardiologist and then went to go get an infant oxygen mask.

By this time Little Husband was a shade of ashen-grey. His feet, however, were blue.

The cardiologist (who was devoid of a personality) walked into the room and offered some lame advice that didn’t help. Another more competent doctor joined us and offered better coaching. In hindsight it occurred to me that not one doctor ever offered a hand in assistance. I guess the technical stuff is beneath them; the egos in that hospital are mountainous.

“It looks as though Little Husband just had his first tet spell,” the competent doctor told us, “unfortunately this means he bought himself a night in the ICU.”
The nurse held Little Husband in a jackknife position as Husband and I took turns holding the oxygen mask to his face. Various doctors, nurses and technicians joined us from time-to-time as we waited for a room in the ICU. Little Husband, semi-conscious, would struggle feebly against the oxygen mask but then give up as if the effort sapped too much of his strength. Due to lack of bed space, three hours passed before we were led to the ICU.

We walked into the ICU and a team of hospital personnel were standing outside the door waiting for us. The atmosphere was charged as everyone visibly sized up Little Husband’s condition. I couldn’t help myself, I started to cry.

Once in our room, the team of nurses went to work putting in an IV and drawing blood. “Wow—we’ve blown two veins already,” one nurses commented to me. I didn’t know how to interpret that statement.

Grateful to be allowed to stay with Little Husband, Husband and I took our post in some chairs stationed against a wall. It had been at least six hours since we arrived at the hospital. I was in a skirt and high-heeled boots. Husband was in dress clothes as well. The chairs, while padded, were as comfortable as metal folding chairs. Finally, the nurses stabilized Little Husband and handed him to me. He was weak with fatigue and nothing like the vibrant, giggling, rolly-polly baby whose diaper I changed just prior to the start of this nightmare. My mind kept flashing back to how cute he looked on that changing table as he smiled up at me and rolled around, knees drawn to his chest. As I gazed down at his sleeping, cherubic face, I studied him for signs of that little boy but there were none. I silently apologized to him for not protecting him. I looked over at Husband---he looked drawn and tired. I’m sure I did too. My heart never broke so hard as it did that night with the three of us alone in our ICU room.

To be continued…