Ho, ho, hospital

I can't believe this is how we are going to end 2019. Actually I shouldn't be surprised...health issues have plagued us all year long. Its officially Christmas and I'm laying in a hospital bed with Hattie. Actually, I'm laying in a hospital bed with Hattie for the second time in the last 24 hours.

Christmas Eve started with a bang! We returned from Minnesota to find that we had no heat. So after a long cold night I was happy to leave the house bright and early for a doctor's appt. while Mitch stayed home and worked out the details of the furnace. Spoiler alert...we need a new one. Merry Christmas to us! I wasn't even close to home when Mitch called and said to get home. Hattie was throwing up and getting welts on her head. When I got there she had a sizable welt on her forehead. I asked if she fell down. She said no. Mitch said he asked her the same thing. The triage nurse, ER nurse, nurse practitioner asked her and we all got the same answer.

The doctor walked in and started to talk to her and oh yeah..." well I did fall getting out of the bathtub this morning." Oh this kid! She still insists that she didn't hit her head. Whatever. She did complain about her elbow hurting. They said she didn't seem concussed, told us to ice and Ibuprofen and sent us on our way.

Into the afternoon my poor girl had stomach pains, the swelling on her elbow, hands and fingers kept getting worse and worse. She still insisted that she didn't fall hard. But looking at her body you'd definitely think otherwise. Around 7:30 she climbed on the couch with Mitch and I.she put her feet on the coffee table and it was covered with a weird rash. Upon further inspection it was all over her legs.

We used our handy HSHS app to talk to the dial-a-doc and she said she really wasn't comfortable with a tech consult and told us to get back to the ER. By then it was 8:30...on Christmas Eve.

We did our intake...again. We had Xrays and got settled in our room. The NP came in and said "I dont like this there is something else going on here." And said she wanted to go get the doctor. After about twenty minutes she came back and said she was doing laps thinking about our sweet girl when she thought about a case she had 20+ years ago with a rare autoimmune disorder, vasculitis something...What?!? The doctor agreed, they took 10 vials of blood. Started her on steroids, gave her antibiotics for her flaming hot elbow, and a sling, with follow-up orders to see our pediatrician. Then doc comes in and wants a strep test. Its strep, people! Ugh!! So now it's nearly 1am on Christmas. She's wiped out, I'm wiped out...and we're going home for Christmas. Finally! We need to follow up with the pediatrician on Thursday or Friday to rule out Henoch-Schonlein purpura, because the ER can't do a skin test. Merry Christmas, my friends...counting our blessings, again!