Bella came home from school on Thursday and wasn't feeling great, but she didn't have a fever and she thought she was just tired.
She woke up Friday morning and was ready to go to school because she was having a friend coming over to spend the night Friday night and we were going to Gardendale's homecoming game. When she got home from school on Friday she was still excited, but she said I'm cold for some reason. I took her temperature and it was 100.2. I called and cancelled her sleep over and she was so mad at me! I quarantined her to the downstairs den because I didn't want Huck or Finley around her. She went to bed Friday night around 8. Tyler went to homecoming and then went to a party so I picked him up at 12:30 and then came home and got in bed. Around 1 AM Huck woke up to eat and I heard Bella. Jason got up to check on her. She wasn't having a hard time breathing, she just sounded really horse when she was breathing so she drank some water and it got better. She slept on the couch so she could wake us up again if she needed us.
The next day her fever got a little higher, but never above 100.6. Her throat was really sore and she couldn't really talk so I was thinking she had strep throat and we would have to go to the doctor first thing Monday morning. We had a little family party for Tyler's birthday and Bella tried to stay away from everyone. She went to bed around 9. No fever, no coughing, breathing normal.
Huck was up eating Sunday morning and I looked at the clock when I heard Bella stumbling up the stairs. It was 1:58 AM. Jason got up with her again, but a few minutes later came to get me. He said you need to look at her, I don't know if she is really this sick or if she is being dramatic. I walked into the bathroom and I was trying to ask her questions, but she was looking all around and kicking stuff. When she finally looked at me I was scared to death! She looked terrible. She was gray, her eyes were sunk in, and it was almost like she wasn't there. I told Jason she had to go to the hospital. I ran to my room to put on some jeans and we were out the door. I kept looking back at her on the way and she never looked any better. I got to children's hospital in about 10 minutes. I'm still not sure how I found it because I hadn't been to the old one in years and I definitely didn't know how to get to the new one, but I found it immediately and pulled into the ER. The valet person was getting someones car and I had to wait a couple of minutes for him to get there. It seemed like a couple of hours. I decided I was going in and I would come out later and move my car, but he pulled in as I was getting Bella out of the car. I drug her into the ER and the lady at the desk asked why we were there. I told her she was having trouble breathing and when she looked up at Bella she asked if that was her normal color. I said definitely not and she told me to bring her around the desk. She checked her heart rate and oxygen levels and then grabbed a desk chair and told her to sit down and then she ran her down the hall yelling at people that she needed them in a room now. Two doctors and 5 or 6 nurses were in there starting an IV, hooking up the heart monitor, attaching the oxygen reader to her finger, starting a breathing treatment, drawing blood, taking x-rays, and talking to me. They got her breathing under control, but 20 minutes later she started having problems again so they had to do a second breathing treatment. That thought they may have to intubate her so they brought the cart to her room. They gave her steroids through her IV and called an ENT to come look at her throat. Jason called around 3:30 and Huck would not go back to sleep without me there so we decided to exchange. He drove to the hospital and I got in his car and came back home. The ENT stuck a camera in her nose and down her throat. Her throat and voice box were so swollen they could barely get it in there. They decided to send her to PICU because they wanted someone to watch her constantly so if it happened again they could treat her before she got so bad. She ended up spending the night in PICU because they were still worried about her and didn't want to risk it. They continued to give her steroids and started antibiotics just in case it was bacterial.
She was moved Monday afternoon to a regular room and spent the night there. They did a few more test on her Tuesday morning and she was discharged around lunch time. I took her to the doctor today for a recheck and the test results showed she tested positive for the flu! No one ever mentioned that and the doctor was a little surprised that she had it. She just had a really bad case. Yesterday was the first day that she was noticeably better. Today she is almost back to normal, but still tired. Hopefully by Monday she will be 100% better and back to her old self. That was definitely the scariest night of our life. I've never had to take any of my kids to the emergency room and I hope I never have to again! I'm so glad that Finley and Huck didn't get it because as bad as it was on Bella, it would have been worse on them. The nurses and doctors at Children's were great and when she was in PICU and there were all those extremely sick kids around her it made me realize even more what I already knew, we are so lucky to have healthy kids!
Sunday afternoon in PICU
Monday afternoon in her regular room eating a happy meal!
