20160820

Appendectomy

She woke up Wednesday morning to tell me that she was having bowel problems. Her expression embarrassed, and also in pain. I told her to see if she felt better by the time school started, instead within an hour she was vomiting in the bathroom.
She spent the next 24 hours puking and moaning. She told me her stomach hurt, and wanted a hot pack. Rice in a sock, microwaved provided some relief. She couldn't keep anything down.
Thursday was the same. She slept fitfully, watch TV, wandered around the house, puked, showered, and repeated this over and over trying to find relief. But nothing really helped.
8pm, the younger girls were asleep (or at least in bed) and she came and sat on the couch to watch TV with us. We talked about her symptoms and noticed she was pointing mainly to the lower right side of her abdomen. We looked up appendicitis and after some discussion I headed to the emergency room with her 9:30.
10 pm we arrived and got checked in. The ride was miserable because every bump caused her to wince and grimace in pain.
Since she hadn't eaten or kept anything down in days, they almost immediately got her started on fluids as well as morphine and zofran. The doctor discussed her symptoms and agreed with appendicitis. It would just take a miserable ultrasound (since she's very thin) to show an enlarged angry appendix.
Antibiotics were started and we waited for a room in the children's hospital. We didn't get taken up until 3:30am.
At 7 the surgeon came and talked to us. At this point she was nearly at a 10 as far as pain. The medicine they'd given her was barely taking the edge off of the excruciating pain.
Daddy arrived around 8:20. And about 9 they took her down to the OR.
Her surgery took longer than we thought it would because when they got in to her the appendix had ruptured and was leaking into her back. There is a term for it, but I can't remember, basically her appendix was located behind her colon so it wasn't as bad as it could have been, but it was more than we hoped.
My mom and dad arrived while she was surgery, they were going to watch Abi, Natalie and Gwen so that Ray and i could be present at the hospital for Rhayn.
When she came out of surgery i chose to go home and shower and nap a little. Knowing that Ray was there for her and that she would be quite drugged for the rest of the afternoon and evening.
I came back to the hospital in time to bring Ray supper and talk to Rhayn a little. Before going home for the night.
This morning I got back to the hospital at about 8:30. Brought Ray breakfast but the smell made Rhayn nauseated so we ate in the parents lounge.
We were able get Rhayn up to walk around the room a little, but she is still in a lot of pain. She also hasn't eaten and they still haven't let her have anything by mouth.
In order for her to get to go home she needs to eating and drinking (in order to take her antibiotics by mouth) as well as able to get out of bed.
Right now she can barely get out of bed.

All of this was made more complicated by her having a cold and her lung function is a little compromised. But she's a healthy young girl and in a few weeks I am sure she'll be back to normal.

No comments:

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...