Emergency Protocols

I remember my very first earthquake as a teacher. In fact, I was a student teacher in the middle of teaching one of my very first lessons, when the walls pulsed. Everyone froze. The students, myself, the cooperating supervising teacher. All of us. Despite the fact, that we have all gone through so many drills. Each one littered with so many eye-rolls that communicated clearly, "We already know this Ms. Payne! We've been doing it every year since kindergarten!" In that moment though, we froze.

The master teacher was the quickest to recover with a quick, "Well?! Duck and cover!"

I have never scrambled to get under a desk so fast! More panicked about the fact that I had frozen in an emergency situation where I was partially responsible for 30 pre-teens, than I was about the earthquake itself.

And over the years, I have learned that the more clearly defined the emergency protocols are, the easier they are to actually follow in the moment amidst all your own anxiety.

And then when it's your kid...

I woke up one morning last September and Cyrus was having a type of seizure I had never seen him experience before. I definitely spent at least five minutes just hoping, or praying or whatever you want to call it, that he would come out of it before I called the on-call pediatric neurologist at like five in the morning. I don't like that panicked moment of indecisiveness where you don't know what to do.

Then I spent the following week asking every neurologist (and there were a lot of them) that walked through the door for directions on what to do during a seizure, and I never felt satisfied that I knew what to do. Maybe there isn't really anything to do.

It wasn't until we reached our outpatient two week follow-up that we sat down and hashed it out.

1) If Cyrus starts having a tonic clonic seizure for longer than 5 minutes give him the emergency medicine.
2) If he has three seizures within one hour, give him the emergency medicine.
3) If he needs two doses within eight hours of each other, give the second dose but immediately call 911 to have breathing assistance on it's way.

I felt good about those directions. Everything was quantified and has clear follow up instructions.

But I quickly learned, that the emergency protocol never feels well-defined in the actual emergency!

What happens when the tiny child starts having partial seizures instead of generalized tonic clonic seizures? Are those as damaging? Do they need as much intervention?

And yeah, he just had three seizures, but each one lasted like three seconds. Whereas earlier today, there was only one seizure, but it lasted three minutes and the convulsions were far stronger. These three seizures can not really be worse than that, can they?

So really, the emergency protocols are actually:

1) Do you feel safe right now? Or are you freaking out?
2) Is Cyrus awake and aware? Or does he seem totally out of it?
3) And sure, if it lasts longer than five minutes... (which has never happened since the two status seizures in September).

So yeah, yay for "well defined" emergency protocols...

This last weekend, the Sun King has been on a hunger strike or something and been showing all kinds of signs of dehydration (extreme sleepiness, little to no urination, urination is darker in color, fever, fussiness, etc.)

Saturday Evening's emergency protocols:
1) If he doesn't pee in eight hours or his urine is significantly darker, call the pediatrician.

Check and check!

During that phone call, she said to give 5 mL of electrolyte infused water or coconut water every ten minutes. And if he still doesn't pee in two hours, take him to the ER.

I have never been so delighted to see a wet diaper in my life!!

He's actually been doing significantly better the last two days. Eating and peeing again. Still sleeping more than normal, but when he's awake he's actually awake! Went to physical and occupational therapy today like normal, and apparently passed his feeding assessment with flying colors!! And practiced standing up again! (The picture is below! You can tell he is thrilled!)

He seemed to have some stomach bug last Thursday that involved multiple vomiting incidents (though each was pretty mild) that probably (in conjunction with one of our medication experiments) caused all of this. Will definitely be relieved when his full appetite and energy come back!!

__________________________

Support Cyrus