Unplanned Doctor Visit and Interesting New Reading Material

When we woke up this morning I knew we weren't feeling our best. Peter and Olivia both had coughs and runny noses. I didn't feel great but it didn't seem to serious. I thought it might be allergies because everything around here is covered in pollen! Olivia was happy and talkative and her appetite was good so I wasn't too concerned. We settled in on the couch for Olivia's breathing treatment. I noticed that she felt a little warm, she hadn't felt warm at all when she woke up. I was surprised to see a change so quickly. I got out the thermometer, her temp was up to 100.5. I called her doctor at Ft. Bragg and he told us to come in at 1pm. I called the PBMT clinic at Duke to tell them that Olivia had a fever and we were going to be going to our local doctor for the first time. We talked about Olivia's symptoms and which tests they might run. They gave me several pager numbers and promised to follow up with the doctor at Ft. Bragg. I was also given the ok to give Olivia a stress-dose of hydrocortisone. They told me that we could go to Duke if we felt more comfortable but we wouldn't have arrived there any sooner than 1pm. We have to start seeing doctors at Ft. Bragg eventually so we might as well start making the transition. I took Olivia's temp again a couple of times and it was still going up. Before we left the house it was all the way up to 101.6!

Mike was able to meet us at the doctor's office at Ft. Bragg (a pro for Ft. Bragg vs. Duke). When we checked in Olivia's temp had already started to go down a bit. We saw the doctor right away. Initially he was very impressed with how well Olivia looked, she was happy and singing. Then he listened to her lungs and asked if she had been coughing. Yes, she has, she's already had her breathing treatment for the day but she is coughing occasionally. He sent us down the hall for a chest ray (I'm on the netbook so I can't type the letter between "w" and "y"). We headed back to the pediatrician's office. He walked us down the hall so that Olivia's port could be accessed. They actually shut down one of the two rooms that they normally use for well-child immunizations so that we could have a clean area to wait in. There was plenty of room (which was a plus since we would end up being in that room for hours). They had the head nurse for the entire peds clinic access Olivia's port. She was really nice but it was obvious that she hadn't accessed a port in years and I'm sure it didn't help that she didn't have any of the right supplies (I'll have to see if I can pick up a few items when we're at Duke in 2 weeks). Those Duke nurses really are the "Best in the World" (that's one of the sayings around Duke Hospital). Of course they access ports 15 times a day so it's almost second nature to them. Olivia was an absolute champ, she actually fell asleep while they were accessing the port but that was the most nerve wracking part of the day for me. All the nurses at Duke follow the same procedure EVERY SINGLE time they access Olivia's port so it was very scary to see it being done so differently and by someone who clearly wasn't as comfortable doing it.

They did a culture to see if Olivia has an infection but he labs looked pretty good considering her fever. Her white count was only 15 (normal range is between 5 and 12) so its good it wasn't too high. Olivia's fever also broke. The chest *-ray looked good so that was a big relief. They decided to give Olivia a dose of IV antibiotics and we headed on our way. The pharmacy in the Ft. Bragg hospital doesn't prepare a lot of IV meds to be administered outpatient so it took quite a while for the medication to be ready. We finally headed out of the hospital a little after 6pm. Mike wasn't able to stay the entire time, once we knew that it wasn't super serious he was able to head back to work. Peter was only able to nap for about 30 minutes today and he was an absolute angel today! We did leave Ft. Bragg with several new books to add to our library at home. They insisted that we take them with us and they are the most random assortment I just have to share, to be clear these are all children's books. The newest titles in our library include:

• The History of Monster Trucks (probably 3rd or 4th grade level, it has chapters but Peter loved the pictures)
• The Little Red Hen
• If You're Happy and You Know It
• Careers for Women in Computer Science (4th or 5th grade level)
• Cooking on 16th Century Whaling Ships

We're heading back in tomorrow and we're hoping that we won't have to get another dose of antibiotics. Olivia was very happy to get home and she happily went to bed at 8pm.