THE FUN WAITING GAME

   We are now at Tuesday, July 8th.  It hit me the night before that something might actually be wrong with my child.  Up until this point, I was so naive about the whole thing and just thought, "Oh he has some bruises.  No big deal."  I didn't let my mind go to the bad things that it might actually be or what we might have to go through as a family.  I have never had to really go through anything too difficult in my life or anything that 'tested the waters' so I didn't think I would with this either.  And to be completely honest, I wasn't sure if God even thought I was strong enough to.  Before this, I didn't know it all, but I knew a lot ;)  At this point, I can tell you I know nothing, and my heart and mind are so much more open to learning/seeing new things.  On that note, I knew I would get a call at 9....nope, nothing.  This had been 24 hours which I was sure that the results would be back by now.  10 o'clock rolls around and I pack the boys up to go to the park.  We meet a group of other moms with their kids up there every Tuesday so I kept my phone with me.  Still nothing.  We try to not really talk about it or why I haven't received a call yet, but we are all wondering why without saying it.  11 o'clock comes and still no call.  I finally text the doctor around noon.  The tests that have come back so far are good, just waiting on a some more. This was great news right?!?  My mass text messages continue to those that I have asked to pray for us over this past weekend.  In my mind I'm still thinking everything will be good and we will forget about this in a couple of months.  We went home, took a nap and still no call from the doctor.  At this point, my gut told me something wasn't right.  I prayed to God that he already knew the results and that we would be fine, he would be with us through this and told myself I was good.  (In hindsight this was a ridiculous assumption!!)  Around 3 I got a call.  The doctor told me, "Jake's platelet levels came back low."  I'm thinking "Okay, low but still okay.."  I asked how low and she said, "6".  Still not able to see the big picture, I asked what they should be.  "150-400".  This is when my heart sank for the second time in pretty much my whole life!  Yes, the first was only 3 days prior.
   The doctor suggested we go to the hospital here in town to re-do the blood work today.  She was putting in a referral to the hematologist and we would get a call from one of two children's hospitals first thing in the morning since they were already closed or almost closed for the day.  Everything else was pretty much a blur even though I was saying okay.  I had only really been to her once before all of this with the boys but I trusted her.  How else would we get to the specialist and I just trusted that God was sending us to the right doctors.  John had been at work early and was on his way home.  I called and told him the news.  It had not hit me, as I was in "let's get this done" mode.  I called a friend to watch Jaden for me while I took Jake to the hospital.  Dropped Jaden off, took Jake up there and 25 minutes later we get to go to the lab (gotta love small town hospitals!)  NOT!!  As we walked in to the lab, you can tell they are not very busy or in any hurry to get anything done.  Very nice women but geez!!!  So this lady gets all her stuff together, tries to talk to Jake about EVERY LITTLE THING!  "What's this?" and "What does this do?" to see if he knows.  I finally say to her, "He knows what things are, he's 4 and just had this done yesterday, and if you don't hurry up I will be passed out in about 2 seconds!"  By the time she goes to poke him we had been at the hospital/lab for about 45 minutes.  Remember, I literally pass out with needles and just seeing them.  I'm fanning myself, trying to hold Jake, and not listen to her commentary about everything.  I finally text John to see if he is almost in town and can just come do this.  It is too much for me.  Plus, I'm trying to not think about the reason that we are having to do this again anyways.  The lady has scared Jake enough by this point that he won't hold his arm out for her (but do we blame him???).  She calls in reinforcement and she finally sticks him and he's saying very loudly, "OUCH, OUCH OUCH!"  but not crying.  I am thinking, this is not how he acted yesterday according to John.  I look over thinking this is taking forever and you can see the needle in his arm NEXT TO THE VEIN!  This was about it for me!  I was fading fast.  The other lady that was called in finally just takes the needle from her, pulls it out some but not out of his skin, and puts it in the vein.  5 seconds later we are done.  Literally right at that moment, John walks in.  Perfect timing :)
   You can see this was a LONG day!  I text the doctor to let her know we were done and that the children's hospital had called to set up an appointment for Friday at 2.  She text me back that she was one the phone with the dr at Scott and White and would call me when she was done.  I felt it was a little odd but wasn't sure what was up.  After 5 that evening, the doctor calls back and says we are to be ready to go to the hospital the next morning.  The doctor at Scott and White said we needed to go in the next morning and start IVIG treatments, be ready to stay the night, but we don't know what time until in the morning since the office is closed.  The hospital is a good hour away, plus we have our other child we have to drop off in the morning, so we knew it would be a long night.  After everything settled some, text were sent out, I spoke to my parents on the phone and I was just sitting outside....I lost it!  What in the world had happened today, or really just after I woke up from our nap?!?!  Was this a dream?  Why is this happening?  and even more What do we do about it?!?!  I was upset, angry, mad, sad, confused,  and scared.  I just prayed and prayed!  Jake prayed that night and Jaden prayed for his brother to get well.  Even after all this, in my mind, I felt Jake would be well again with 'good numbers' by the end of the week.