The Day Life Looked Very Different (Part 2)

Continued from The Day Life Looked Very Different (Part 1)

Let me tell you, that van could not have gone any faster!  When we arrived at the hospital we hurried in the emergency room doors.  When said why we were there the guy at the desk said, “I never heard a helicopter land.”  Okay rule two, don’t tell a distraught woman whose child should have landed over an hour earlier that you didn’t hear the helicopter. He did however hurry us through the corridors to the PICU.  When we came through those doors we instantly saw Quinton.  The door to his room was open.  He was so pale laying on that bed.  He was hooked up to numerous wires, monitors, and I.V.’s, but he was alive.  I didn’t know what the future held but I was praising God that he was still alive.

The first friends arrived soon and were able to sit with the kids while we met with the PICU Doctor.  He told us that Quinton had been without sufficient oxygen long enough that his brain had swelled.  Only time would tell how he would be.  There was a possibility that he would remain in a vegetative state.

Soon another friend arrived and we agreed that she would take the four older kids.  The kids were willing to go as they were going to be staying with close friends (at the time they had 6 kids, talk about a full house!) until my mom could get there to get them.

Thankfully at the time Quinton was still nursing, this would turn out to be so crucial in the days to come.

Thursday they began to reduce the medicine that Quinton was on so that he could begin to come out of the medically induced coma.  The nurses and doctor were cautious while doing this to see how his little body would respond.  As he woke up, he was not at all happy about all the wires and tubes attached to his body.  He did not understand that they were for his good; he just wanted them away from him.

I asked the nurse on duty if I could let him nurse.  She was not very optimistic, saying that the doctor normally didn’t allow the kids to eat when they just woke up.  However, she did go ask.  I was so relieved when she returned saying that he could nurse.  Nursing seemed to be the only thing that would comfort him over the next few days.  I believe that him being able to nurse also helped his little body to heal.

Quinton was put through a battery of tests trying to determine the cause of his seizure.  They checked for accidental poisoning, heart issues, brain abnormalities etc. and finally decided that he had suffered from an atypical febrile seizure.  They called it atypical because of the length that he seized.  Scott and I had no idea at the time that a normal seizure would be just a few seconds to a few minutes in length.  Quinton’s had lasted for at least 30 minutes!  During the seizure, Quinton had also aspirated stomach contents which not only caused the awful raspy breathing during the seizure but led to pneumonia.  He was on breathing treatments for the next four days.  (I still wonder if he had his sister’s stomach bug and vomited while he was sleeping and aspirated that first, leading to a lack of oxygen that could cause a seizure.  We will never know for sure one way or the other.)

Finally on Sunday he was released from the hospital.  The boy that had been so cute as he ran after his older siblings on Wednesday morning could no longer stand or walk.  His balance was completely off.

Over the next few weeks we watched a miracle unfold as he regained his ability to stand, walk and then even run.  We are so thankful that God healed his little body!

I used to pray for those involved when I would see an ambulance or medical helicopter.  I still pray for those families involved however I now thank God for His faithfulness when we were that family.

Today Quinton is a busy, ornery four year old.  Of course, he doesn’t remember anything about those days in May, but the rest of us do.  He now knows that he flew in a helicopter and that he had a seizure and has started to ask lots of questions about what happened.

On the left: Quinton on the way home from the hospital.
On the right: Quinton showing off a chicken egg three years after his seizure.

I pray that you too will feel the hand of God as he holds you close during those days in your life that “look very different” than what you have pictured.

Blessings,

Jennifer