It is well with my soul

The second half of January shaped up to be one of the most difficult few weeks of my life. I’ve been working hard at being calm and giving myself grace as I heal and try to manage life. 

On Monday, 1/17, Lexi texted me that Carter had been up all night with a high fever and wanting confirmation to take him to the ER. He ended up taking a good nap and then when she was changing him she found a warm lump on his left knee. 

She took him to urgent care, where they pretty quickly sent them to the ER. His fever wasn’t coming down with just Tylenol, so they were able to help him with that. They suspected a joint infection in his knee, so they admitted him. 

They hung out all that next day and planned to do an MRI the next morning, so he couldn’t eat anything after midnight and he was so sad. 

It was hard to get him to sleep in the crib so they ended up holding him a lot. 

His fever had at least come down. At this point they were thinking it might not be a knee infection. 

He had his MRI Wednesday morning and came back groggy and starving. 

That afternoon they decided to drain his knee, so anesthesia of the day #2 happened. They knew they’d be staying another night by this point, so Cade stayed with Car-car and Lexi was able to go home and see Emmi and pack some clothes.

He came back from his knee drainage super super tired. 

But before nighttime sleep, momma cuddles. 

These pictures made my worried heart so happy. 

I would have been in Montana in a hot second, but my surgery was scheduled for Monday the 24th and I really needed to be able to breath again. I know how hard it was for Lexi to have to leave her first baby to be with her baby baby, and I would have loved to have hung out with Emmi and to be able to see Carter at the hospital and buoy up Alexis and Cade. It’s hard to be far away. 

When they drained his knee they got a lot of blood, so then they were talking about a possible blood clotting disorder, which was super scary. He also started to feel sick and his leg was obviously bothering him again. That’s how the days went, one good day, one bad day. 

Because he still wasn’t improving and they thought he had a blood disorder, they decided to tranfer them to a childrens hospital in Kalispell about 5 hours away. Because there were snowstorms, they decided to fly them, so they spent the day waiting for their medical transport. Around 5:00 they went by ambulance to the airport. 

Then they were transferred to this red Learjet. 

And then flown to Kalispell. Lexi said she could touch both sides of the plane from the stretcher where she held Carter. 

They were immediately met by a team of doctors that had already reviewed all of Carter’s labs. The hematologist said it didn’t look like there was a blood disorder after all, so he stepped back. The surgeon had just finished a surgery and had her OR on standby, and after examining Carter said she’d like to take him straight back to open his knee. 

So for the third time in 2 days, before Cade even made it to the hospital in his car, they took Carter back, put him under anesthesia, and opened his knee. They cleared out a lot of blood and also infection from the back of his knee, and then flushed it all out 3 times to make sure they got it all. They said the hospital in great falls must have knicked something to have gotten so much blood when they drained his knee, and that his surgery went perfectly. 

That day he was really fussy and sad. He really went through a lot for a little guy. Then that evening he perked up and was playful and eating and getting around with his spider crawl, straight leg. 

The childrens hospital was really nice and everyone was so great. We FaceTimed and laughed as he crawled to their door and watched and waved at people as they walked down the halls. 

By Saturday afternoon he was back to not using his leg at all and very fussy. They switched him to a different antibiotic and switched to oxy to see if he would get a fever, which he immediately spiked to 102° again. 

He loves mommy and daddy so much and they just held him and held him. Thankfully Cade’s mom was able to fly up and be with Emmett. 

He had to be connected to his iv for antibiotics several times a day, and he hated it. He was pretty miserable. 

Sunday, the day before my surgery, was a really hard day. The dr’s in Kalispell were at a loss, they just didn’t know what to do next because they didn’t know why Carter wasn’t getting better. They work with another Childrens hospital in Colorado, so they had a conference call with them to get ideas.  

We had a family fast and just prayed, prayed, prayed.

They decided to try one more super strong antibiotic blend before opening his knee again. 

That day in preparation for my surgery Matt and Grandpa Ray gave me a beautiful priesthood blessing and I felt calm and reassured and safe. 

By Monday morning Carter’s calf started to swell and some of the numbers from his blood tests kept climbing in a bad way. 

I was praying and working to stay positive and calm for my surgery that morning. At 10:30 Matt dropped me off, gave me a hug and kiss, and I was on my own. 

I got checked in, got my Covid and pregnancy test (not sure which I’d have been more upset about being positive) and all set in my gown. 

IV, a million questions from the nurses, meet with surgeon, meet with anesthesiologist, and wait. 

I brought a big bag of treats for all my nurses, and Delaney made some really cute cards for them. In one she thanked them for helping her mom with her “Thiroyd nojules.” One of the nurses took my bag and split everything so the surgical nurses could have half and my recovery nurses could have the other half. Then 2 more nurses came by and asked all about Delaney because they loved her card so much. They brought her 2 beautifully crocheted blankets to thank her. Everyone was so amazing. And here I sat anxiously waiting till 12:30. 

My last picture with my thyroid. We had a good run. 

Carter sent this to me because we were hospital buddies. 

I had been updating our family Fb page about Carter every night and I had been talking to my mom a lot. I noticed that on Sunday night she hadn’t commented on Carter’s tough day. I felt uneasy about that, but I’m a worrier and I was working on being positive and peaceful pre-surgery. I called her Monday morning to let her know I was doing well and I was ready to get on with life sans-thyroid, and she didn’t answer. My unease turned to alarm, but my catastrophic worries have never come to fruition, so I made Matt promise to reach out to and update my mom, and left it at that. 

My surgery went really well. I was definitely blessed to be super calm. The OR was big and cold and scary, but it was all fine, I was calm and so ready to be done. I came out of anesthesia and spent a lot of my time at the hospital super hot, but the nurses gave me ice packs that helped. I had had visions of reading and relaxing that night, but I was so groggy from my anesthesia that I slept a ton. My nurse and I took a short walk as soon as I got to my room, (I read it’s important to walk as soon as you can after surgery) and then the next time I woke up, around 8:30, I FaceTimed home. I told them I went for a walk and I was going back to sleep. The next thing I really remember was waking up in the morning and FaceTime’ing home again. I asked Matt about my mom and he said she’d never responded to any of his calls or texts, and then I knew something was terribly wrong. I called Amy to tell her to make sure that Joe checked on mom. It was all I had the energy for before going back to sleep. 

Dr Chen came to see me late morning and everything looked good, so he discharged me. I got home right around lunchtime and came straight up to bed. Matt went to pick up my long list of meds while I slept. 

I woke up to missed calls from Joe and Amy. A few minutes later Joe sent out a group text to the siblings that our mom had had a serious stroke on Sunday night. She managed to call 911, so she had been in the hospital, but they somehow didn’t have her name. A neighbor that had seen the ambulance finally googled her name and left a message for my sister in law Sara, who works at the hospital where my mom had been taken. Because of that message, and my asking Joe to check on her she was finally found. 

My mom was completely paralyzed on the right side of her body, even unable to swallow. Her speech was mostly garbled and she was very frustrated by everything. She was happy to see joe and Sara, and also confused and scared. I can’t even begin to put into words my heartbreak about again not being able to be there for my family in need. 

Thankfully Carter had begun to improve on Tuesday. He was happy and mobile and on Wednesday, instead of continuing with our one bad day one good day pattern, he kept improving. 

My mom started therapies - speech, occupational, and physical, and her speech and swallow have improved. She was able to eat puréed food and drink water slowly, so she was able to be transferred to a rehab facility. Amy and sandy flew down to be with her that Friday. I’m so thankful my siblings are unified and that we are a family that serves and loves each other. We’ve got it worked out that each of us will visit her for about a week for the next few months. 

She has a long road ahead and we’re not sure she’ll ever be able to live independently again. My strong, independent  mom lived alone and loved to travel, so this is all really devastating.

This sweet boy continued to feel better and tried to play, in spite of his huge robot hand and bum leg. 

This is his new way to get around. He’s just now starting to normal crawl again. 

Finally on Wednesday, after 9 long days in the hospital, he was discharged. 

He’s got huge amounts of antibiotics to take multiple times a day, weekly blood draws, and lots of monitoring going forward, but we are all so thankful he is on the up and up. His final diagnosis was septic arthritis - an infection in the joint fluid and tissue of the knee. He’s mostly back to normal, other than the crawling, and he still babies his hurt leg, he leans to the right when he stands, and always comes down on the right when he does his spider crawl. This precious and tough guy went through so much and we’re all so grateful he’s doing better. 

My mommy is very emotional. Sometimes she gets very discouraged, sometimes she speaks very clearly, and sometimes she slurs so that we can’t understand her. She’s not able to use her phone without help yet, so she’s very lonely when she doesn’t have a visitor (only one allowed at a time). I won’t be able to visit until the end of the month, and I am just bracing myself for an emotional visit. I love her so much and I’m just really trying to manage all of my big emotions around this unexpected change of life. 

I am recovering slowly. I get tired easily, but I’ve been up and doing a little more each day. I’m still resting a lot. I discovered The Amazing Race on Hulu and it’s been a fun, light-hearted way to keep my mind off all the hard things. I’m trying to walk everyday, but it’s been so cold that there have been a few days that I didn’t make it out. I’m working on patience and loving myself. I’ve cycled through several of the stages of grief about my mom. 

In all of the hard and the tears, I have felt the spirit so close to my heart. That is not making these trials easier, but its making me stronger. Matt and the girls have been so wonderful and have been such a comfort to me. I feel the prayers being prayed. I know Heavenly Father knows me. I know that He knows and loves my mom and Carter and that He has a plan for each of us. That plan is so different than any of us thought it would be, but His ways are so much better than mine ever could be. I know that, and that brings me so much peace. I am clinging to my covenants in ways I haven’t before and I am praying and learning and growing in ways I haven’t before too.