A Trip to the Emgergency Room

We took our first trip to the emergency room today since March 4, 2009 when Riley had his seizure. It is a long story...

Last night, we put Riley to bed but he still had a couple of meds to get, so Joel left his G tube connected in his tummy so we could give the meds after Riley was asleep. We have done this many, many times. Joel went to bed pretty soon after and I stayed up watching some TV. Or at least I tried. I woke up still in the rocking chair at some point in the night and was ready for bed. We use a monitor with Riley, and I unplugged it and took it to the bedroom with me because it was my night to be on duty. The next thing I knew, I woke up at 7:30 this morning. I thought it was odd I hadn't heard Riley all night, so I picked up the monitor and that is when I realized it was dead! Since it had been plugged in in the living room, I assumed it had been plugged in all day, since it usually is. Apparently, it wasn't, and I have no idea how long it had been dead. I didn't hear Riley and thought he was probably still asleep, so I went in to the living room and plugged in the monitor. As soon as I did, I heard Riley. He was awake.

When I walked in to Riley's room, he was down at the foot of his bed on his knees. He was holding on to the bed rail, so I believe he had scooted down to the end holding on to it. He had taken off his pull up and pants as well. As soon as I went to him, he grabbed on to me, wanting me to pick him up. Riley has a bulletin board in the shape of a surf board hanging over his headboard. It is up pretty high and has all kinds of things hanging on it, like pictures, things Riley has made, pictures he drew, etc. As I looked around the room, I say two things that had been hanging on the board lying in the floor. Riley would have had to have stood up to pull down anything from the surf board. I was upset since it was obvious Riley had been up for awhile, maybe even hours, and had obviously gotten upset enough that no one came in when he called. I took Riley to the living room and rocked him and he went back to sleep. I didn't think much about it at first, but as the morning went on, it became more and more obvious that Riley was clinging to us and would not let us put him down. He was scared. We began to wonder more and more about how long Riley may have been up alone. I went back in to his room and noticed scratched marks going down the wall below the surf board. I'm not sure if he was trying to climb up, maybe on his headboard, or maybe fell and scratched the wall as he went down. Regardless, it just made me feel even worse about the dead monitor. Then it got even worse.

Since Riley had went back to sleep, he had not eaten, which means he had not gotten any of his meds. He has to have food on his stomach before we start giving him the many meds he has to get each day. We tried to get him to eat a couple of times but he didn't. Since it was the weekend and we were just kind of hanging around, we weren't really rushing around this morning. Finally, I decided to go make Riley's bed. When I pulled the covers back, I saw his G tube laying in the bed. Not only the tube that we attach to the button that is in his tummy, but the tube and the button still attached. The part that should have still been inside his stomach was lying there on the bed. Not good. The tube had been left in because I got up and went to bed, forgetting to give Riley his last three meds last night. We've left the tube in before with nothing happening, but I guess with with Riley moving all over the place, it either got pulled out, or Riley pulled it out himself. Joel has had to put the button back in Riley's tummy one other time, but it was when we knew it had come out and he did it right away. This time, he couldn't do it because the hole had closed up. We called Dr. Steph who called the hospital. We had to take Riley in to the emergency room. Since he was still clinging to us (we assume he was/is traumatized by whatever happened last night and/or this morning), we knew there was no way he was going to lay there and let the doctor try to do the procedure. They decided it would be best to sedate Riley and do the procedure in the O.R.

The procedure was very quick and we didn't have to stay in recovery very long either. However, when we got down to the car to leave, Joel noticed that, once again, the button was out! We turned around and went straight back to the O.R. This time, Riley's tummy was still numb and the doctor was able to get the second new button placed while Joel held Riley.

So not what we expected our Saturday to be. Riley is still very clingy and seems scared if he is not in his chair or not being held. We will just have to give him more hugs and love and make him feel secure and know that we will be there whenever he needs us. I don't think I will ever forgive myself for not taking the charger in with me last night, or for leaving the tube in overnight. Hopefully tomorrow will be less eventful.