The scariest day of my life

Alyssa woke up yesterday morning with what looked like an eye infection in her left eye. It was oozing and a little crusty... eek. I got her into the doctor at 10:00. Yep, that's our second Saturday doctor visit and this kid isn't even three weeks old yet.

We saw a doctor we'd never seen before and one of the first things she mentioned was the big lump on Alyssa's head, the totally obvious one, probably from the vacuum used during delivery. I asked her if we should be concerned about the lump because of its size or because it hasn't gone away yet and she said, "Oh no! They called my brother 'Coconut Head' for the first couple of months because he had one. It's normal. You have no reason to be concerned. It will go away."

So that was a relief.

But then she just kept rubbing Alyssa's head for what seemed like an eternity. Not saying anything, just rubbing her head and looking into her eyes. No biggie, except it just went on and on. I got a little nervous but kept telling myself maybe it was her way of soothing the baby or something, though Alyssa was calm as could be. Or maybe she just loves babies and rubbing their heads? Anyway Scott and I were shooting each other strange looks when the doctor finally started asking questions... about Alyssa's sleeping patterns and eating patterns. Is she irritable? No. Does she spit up? Yes. Has she spit up forcefully? Yeah, funny that you ask, she did yesterday. Have we noticed anything strange about her eyes? Again, funny that you ask, but I thought her sister's eyes had looked strange too so I thought it was just a baby thing.

So then the doctor used the phrase, "I don't want to alarm you, but..."

I think it was at that point that I began feeling truly alarmed. Even horrified, terrified and scared out of my mind. And it only got worse from there. According to the doctor, the soft spot on Alyssa's head was swollen (the big lump in back was no big deal, the small lump in front was a very big deal) and she had "sunsetting" of the eyes. They occasionally look a bit bulgy and you can see a lot of white above the iris. You can't see the bottom of the iris at all (picture a sunset), so that combined with the vomiting and other things we'd mentioned had her very concerned. There might be swelling in her brain... Breathe... She told us we needed to go to Children's Hospital Emergency for tests... Breathe, breathe, breathe... and there was a good chance that she would be admitted for the night. Breathe, breathe...

The doctor was very comforting: holding my hand, rubbing my back, talking in the most soothing way. I wavered between loving her because she had such a wonderful bedside manner and just being truly horrified because she thought we needed so much comfort. Clearly this was BAD. Poor woman knew she'd really upset me and seemed to feel horrible about it. I can't imagine being a doctor and having to give people bad news.

So then we had to start figuring out the logistics of this thing. Directions to the hospital. Should we take Amanda with us or try to find a babysitter? Scott's mom was scheduled to arrive sometime that day but we weren't sure when. My sister and my two nieces were planning to come to my house that afternoon so I could take pictures of them all dressed up for Katie's homecoming banquet. We were supposed to have a surprise birthday dinner at our house the following day for Scott's grandfather's 85th birthday. Trying to figure out the details on all that stuff seemed like a good way to avoid thinking about what we didn't want to think about anyway.

We headed for the hospital and started making phone calls on the way. Despite my best efforts to remain cool, calm and collected, I was a mess. I called my sister Darin to tell her the photo-shoot was off and she immediately offered to meet us at the hospital which hadn't even occurred to me... I kept saying no because I figure she would need to help the girls get ready for Homecoming but I finally said yes, please come. So glad I did too. I wonder how the day would have gone differently if she hadn't been there. She shows up and I calm down immediately.

It was an unbelievably long day. Alyssa was poked and prodded and was not allowed to eat in case she'd have to go into surgery, but she was a total trooper. Thank you Alyssa!!! I know I would have been a whole lot more freaked out if she hadn't been so calm. We waited what seemed like forever for her to get a CT scan – the test that would hopefully tell us what was wrong. She kept getting bumped down the list because trauma patients take precedence. I was nervous about it taking so long because the nurse had explained that you have to lie perfectly still for the CT scan which is no big deal for someone older, but the hope is that an infant will sleep through it. Since Alyssa slept most of the day and had nothing to eat, I was afraid by the time she got her turn she'd be wide-awake and starving. And if they weren't able to keep her still she would be brought back to our room to wait for another turn, when she'd be even hungrier!

The nurse had also explained that parents aren't allowed in the room during the CT scan, but when Alyssa finally got her turn, the nurse let me stay with her because she said I was the calmest mother of an 18-day-old she'd seen in her entire career. I said, "Yeah? You should have seen me on the drive over. I was a disaster!" I just kept telling myself, "Calm mommy, calm baby," Alyssa only cried for a minute or two and then, though she was wide awake, she laid perfectly still for the entire scan. Thank you again, Alyssa!

It took an hour to get the results back from the scan. And the results were normal. NORMAL. Normal, normal, normal. Can you feel my relief? She's fine. Alyssa is fine.

Of course they want to follow-up on this. We need to watch her carefully and take her back to the hospital if we see anything out of the ordinary: sleeping too much, unusual irritability, vomiting, fever. And we need to go back to the doctor tomorrow. But the fact that the CT scan was normal means everything.

My baby girl is fine. And I have never been so grateful for anything in my entire life.