Hospital Visit

Our Sick Boy

For Memorial Day, we went up to my grandma’s home in Idaho. Before we left, Ryker had been acting like he was coming down with a cold, but we thought it might be his teeth. I took him in to the doctor’s before we left and they assured me he was just suffering the ill effects of teething and not to worry. However, the Sunday just before Memorial Day, Ryker threw up a ton of fluid and started crying and wouldn’t stop. Erick and Richard gave him a blessing and we finally got him to sleep. Monday, on the way home, we stopped in Pocatello for lunch, where Ryker threw up a ton again. I was worried. He was very irritable and wouldn’t drink or eat. We tried to give him Pedia-lite but he threw that up and then his fever spiked and he was breathing funny.

After considering our options, we ran him in to McKay-Dee Hospital’s ER. We arrived at 11:30 p.m. and stayed in the ER until 5 a.m. the next day. They had done a chest X-ray, a nasal wash to check for viruses, and had done a breathing treatment on him to open up his lungs. They finally did a blood draw and inserted an IV to get fluids in him. They finally sent us up to the Pediatrics unit where they wanted to watch him because his oxygen levels were so low.




When we got up to the Peds Unit, they had to re-do his IV because they couldn’t flush it and it was so hard to hear him cry. Everything they did required Erick and me to hold him down and we knew it wasn’t pleasant but necessary. We spent all of June 1st in the hospital and by the 2nd, we were released to go home. They had determined on the 1st that he had a virus called the Human Metapneumovirus (similar to RSV) on top of the Rhino Virus (common cold). The left him hooked up to the IV to get him hydrated, did regular breathing treatments and had him on some antibiotics to keep him from developing a secondary infection.




The people of McKay-Dee’s staff were so awesome to work with and they helped Erick and I in every way possible to keep us comfortable since we hadn’t slept all night and then just got a little bit here and there. We also were so thankful to family who brought us meals or came to visit us and Ryker. It was so scary for me and Erick and definitely scary for Ryker.