First, I’m thankful for the rest this week and weekend….although I’m sure I still have a little catching up to do, I’m almost back to being really energized (and ready for the next big catastrophe). Second, I’m really thankful this wasn’t my weekend to be on.
So, for those of you who don’t know or haven’t figured it out, since I’m the nurse for the BH, I give out all the meds every day Mon-Fri at 1pm; always there checking them out, working on administrative kinda stuff, updating policies for the new Mozambican nurse, working on updating records and getting things all in order (ie. dietary stuff, physical therapy, growth charts, medical records, stuff like that). Anyway, I have some help with giving out the rest of the meds for 7:30 am and 6pm shifts. There were 3 of us, but Jannie decided she just had to go get married to James, so they are off in Denmark getting married (glad they’re coming back too). So Jannie did 2 med shifts a week (which includes, for the am shifts, making about 25 bottles for the 3 babies on special formulas so they grow better) and took a weekend shift every 6th wkend. Erin and I kinda split up the rest, with me taking an extra shift since she has other obligations on base anyway. But now that Jannie’s gone it’s just me and erin for the wkend (we’re doing an every other rotation) which means you get all the med shifts Friday night, all day sat and Sunday, plus the 1pm meds sat and sun, make all the bottles for all the tots on Saturday morning and sometime Sunday morning too (which is finally down to 56 bottles-praise God!); and deal with any sickness issues. So Erin and I have each picked up an extra shift where Jannie was doing them during the week and praise God Hilary decided to step up and at least give meds for me on Thurs nights-yeah I could squeeze you!
This weekend was the other Erin’s weekend and on Friday (other erin does Friday mornings) Dionisio decided he just couldn’t stand not being sick any longer….and came down with malaria…well it started Thurs night, but we were sleeping….vomiting, diarrhea….erin found him first thing Friday morning with a high fever and did a malaria test…..POSITIVE. By that time I couldn’t get him to take any of the fever meds I was trying to give him…I was thankful that we can get paracetamol (essentially Tylenol-esque medicine)suppositories…but there are no such things for ibuprofen and recall the kid hates meds. He kept holding it in his mouth not swallowing it, vomiting all over me, and pretty much anything else he could do…well when you’re fever is close to 104 you’ve got to take meds. You’d think he’d just feel so crappy he’d take it right….nope not when it comes to things going into his mouth….all the fight left in him shows up…then back to being listless and sad. Knowing he would have to take yucky antimalarial meds or die, we conferred and came up with our game plan…..buddle him up and stick the ng tube back in. I know, we’re mean. I’m over it. So we started giving him antimalarial meds and today, he looks much much better. It took a little rehydrating through the ngt and lots of coaxing from the tias for him to eat, but we’ll take out the ngt tomorrow. His last fever was yesterday afternoon and it was just barely one.
Then yesterday, Nemias decided he had more attention and fun in the hospital and would really like to go back…he started spiking fevers again that at least responded to med…malaria test negative and he’s still on antibiotics from last week. This morning his fever stopped responding to meds and got way too high….back to the hospital he went. They decided to admit him after about 6 hours (again thankful it wasn’t me) and put him on the exact same meds as last time….didn’t we learn anything guys? Tests shows he still has the urinary tract infection, but this time…they’re going to do a cultural of the urine to see what he’s growing and what medicine will actually kill it instead of just guessing and changing them around a bunch till his fever went away. Everyone together now…..ohhhh. ahhhhh. How exciting and brilliant. I know, I know…..that’s what I was thinking too. Eye roll here. Hopefully, this time they’ll get it right…although prayers will probably be much more effective. And hopefully he’ll be home again soon (again)!
Tomorrow’s another day and a new week. This weekend will be mine…prayers for a calm uneventful next 7 days puhlease! I wanna just play with the kids! J
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