Rainy Day in Oregon

By jerispics

A close call

This isn't what I had in mind to post today. You'll understand why if you read this.

Yesterday we received a phone call from our son-in-law that our granddaughter had "eaten" some of his blood pressure medication.
He was at work, mommy was in the bathroom and Gracie pulled a chair up to the counter and got the pill bottle off the top of the microwave. This 2 year old was able to open the "child proof" cap and put the 6 pills he had left in her mouth. Bitter tasting she spit them out and told mommy the pills were "yucky". Mommy called Poison Control, they said to get her to the ER. She called her mother-in-law and they raced to the next town, fifteen minutes away, 10 minutes if you're driving a sick child.
At the ER they couldn't get an IV started. She was fighting them and they "stuck" her 4 times and couldn't get one. Her blood pressure was dropping, down to 45/15 at one point, they had to get an IV started. Finally called in someone from surgery to do it. He had to stick her 2 times. She was screaming and fighting them. He got it done and they gave her dopamine to raise her BP. It seemed to be working, but to be cautious and have her monitored by pediatric specialists they had her flown from North Bend to Doernbecher Childrens Hospital in Portland. Quite an experience for Gracie and mommy. Of course while this was going on, Grampa was driving home from work as fast as he could while I packed a bag. Since we live 3 1/2 hours north of them (by car) we beat them to Portland by about an hour. We needed to be there to meet our daughter and granddaughter at the hospital. Our daughter texted our phone when they landed, and were loaded into an ambulance for the 20 minute drive to the hospital. Gracie was doing good at that point and was watching a Dora the Explorer movie in the ambulance! They are totally child oriented! Upon arrival they checked her vitals and decided to stop the dopamine and see how she was doing. They didn't have to give her anymore. She was afraid of the nurses if they were trying to do anything with her "tubes and lines" as she had been hurt so many times. Can't blame her there. We couldn't let her off our laps because she was hooked up to several things. That didn't sit well either, being a precocious 2 year old. Needless to say, no one got much sleep. This picture is of Gracie in her cage crib, just before we headed home. The nursing staff was relieved she could go, because she was getting into everything. That made us happy of course, because that meant she was her usual self again, and that she got to go home. There were several critical children there and it was sad to see them in that situation. We were very lucky this incident could be turned around.
Warning: Child resistant caps are NOT!

I back-blipped yesterdays photo.

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