It's Christmas eve and I don't care. At this point I just want this year to be over. Never in 100 years did I think the last two weeks of what we normally consider "the most wonderful time of the year", could end in so much stress and sadness. My family and I haven't had a good night's sleep in over a week and have spent roughly 30 plus hours of the last 5 days in one hospital or another. It started early in the week when Kher was having his middle of the night wake up sessions. He's been doing it for a few weeks, but it's not a big deal. He wakes up and in turn, we do as well...we watch a movie and have a snack until he gets tired. If it's 20 minutes, or 3 hours, we're right there with him.
This week though, he started having fits. We haven't seen these fits it quite some time, to my recollection. He screams and cries uncontrollably, tensing his entire body and reaching his arms and fingers out, not wanting to be touched. When he was a baby, we spent many nights in the er...trying to find out what was wrong with our baby. We were told it was reflux, given meds and eventually we got things under control. He's not so little now, even though he's still a baby. He had been dealing with a fever for days before Wednesday and Tuesday night he developed a small patch of patechia on his lower buttox cheek. Brooke was worried but we were told by our pediatrician that if he didn't improve, to take him into the er on Wednesday. Wednesday came and he started having fits, like he used to when he was younger. Between his fever, the rash and his fits we decided to take him to Tacoma General.
Once we were in a room, we described what the issue was and the doctors went to work. Upon beginning examination the doctor noticed random bruising on Kher. When they inquired about the patechia we told him the details of when we noticed it and the doctor made a comment of the various bruising. We explained clearly to him that Kher is an extremely active baby and doesn't have his motor functions fully mastered yet. He falls a lot and bumps into things frequently, especially when he's getting sleepy. The doctor then explained that he was concerned that some of the bruises were in "uncommon places" like on the outsides of his thighs as opposed to his knees (because apparently all babies get bruises in the exact same places?). They said they wanted to do imaging to make sure he didn't have any fractures or breaks, on top of tummy x-rays for constipation, to which we gladly complied. We wanted all bases covered and wanted to cancel out any possibilities as to why he might be in pain. Kher had been having a terrible experience up to this point with the doctors and nurses and the longer the night went, the worse it felt for our whole family.
When their team did the first blood draw, a male nurse proclaimed "man, he really is strong" commenting on how difficult it was to keep him still. Keep in mind any time we try to put a diaper on...get him dressed, it's a fight. We had also earlier explained that this could have been the cause of any one of his bruises. The second time they said they had to draw blood again because their sample had coagulated, i began crying. When they asked why i was crying, i replied "I just can't stand to see my son in pain." After everything was said and done, the team found no conclusive answers for his fits or pain, but notified us that an advocate would be coming in to speak with us. We didn't think much of it until the advocate explained why she was there. We were both shocked and saddened to hear that the team expressed concern that we may be abusing our son due to the bruising and the rash, as the rash could have been the result of him being spanked. We were told a cps worker would be by to visit us anywhere between 24 hours and 3 days.
We arrived home some time around 10 or 11am the next day (Thursday) and immediately went to sleep. A cps worker came knocking on our door late that afternoon. She explained to us why she was there and that allegations of abuse had been made. We tried to keep a composed head while answering all her questions and then she separated us to speak with us independently. She asked me some questions about home and work and then she asked me questions about methods of punishment. I explained to her that Kher isn't even 2 yet and doesn't really actively communicate. Punishing him wouldn't accomplish anything. We just try to redirect him to the best of our ability. I work at a behavioral school as a behavior intervention specialist, so I have experience with behaviorally challenged children from broken homes. It surprised and irritated me to find out that she asked me about punishment methods, but didn't find it necessary to ask Brooke when she had asked Brooke a few of the other questions she ask me. It fucking infuriated me while walking the cps worker back to her car when she inquired about a specific note the nurse had taken during Kher's second blood draw when I was crying. She said that the nurse had quoted me saying something to the effect of me "not wanting him to be hurt anymore." I can't remember exactly how she worded it, but I vividly remember getting the impression that the wording implied some sort of guilt on my part for either actions, or knowledge of actions taken against my son. I corrected her as to what I had actually said and why I said it and she went on her way. Before leaving, she notified me that this would be ongoing and we could expect a police visit.
Since then, we have been to urgent care and Seattle Children's trying to find out what's wrong with our baby, because he's still having fits. On Christmas eve...this day, he had a fit that worried us to the point we were about to spend Christmas in the er, but he got through it before we could leave. Every time he feels good and is playing, or running through the house and falls, our stomachs sink because we wonder if he'll wind up.with a bruise. We're letting him bounce around the house without a diaper on because if we try to put one on and he puts up a fight, we just give up. It's snowing on Christmas for the first time I can remember in years, and I don't care. I just my baby to be happy and healthy...and to crawl into a hole. Merry Christmas.
