Cait's Ambulance ride

So a couple weeks ago Cait checked off another first by taking an ambulance ride to the hospital! Now I thought I'd share this story in it's entirety so people understand exactly what happened. Ben was at work and I was putting the girls to bed. It had been a long exhausting day so I was taking my time getting upstairs. The big girls were in the bathroom brushing her teeth and Cait decided to join in. Apparently she climbed onto the toilet (or counter) and then slipped and fell and hit her head. I heard the fall and ran quickly to grab her. I was there within 2 seconds and had her in my arms. While in my arms her eyes rolled back and she had a seizure. It lasted maybe 5-10 seconds tops. Then she passed out. Again, this lasted maybe 5-10 seconds tops. So basically she hit her head, had a seizure and passed out all within 30 seconds. My first instinct was that this was normal. But I thought I'd double check, so I called my mom and she recommended I call the health link. So I did. I waited on hold for 10 minutes. In that time Cait had come to, but was still sleepy and lethargic on my lap. I've called health link a million times and never once have they made me promise to get off the phone ASAP and call 911! But this time they did.

Apparently this wasn't as normal as I'd thought. So I called 911 and they reassured me that I absolutely was right to call them and then Cait most definitely needed to ride an ambulance to the hospital. I guess with this kind of situation there's always the chance she'll have another seizure on the hospital and she could also lose consciousness again. If that happens while I'm driving, there really is no way to make sure she's ok...not choking etc. So we waited for the ambulance to come. By the time it showed up Cait was fully alert an acting 100% normal...so I was second guessing the ambulance. But they reassured me over and over again that you don't want to take any risks when it comes to head injuries. So off we went - I left the girls with a friend. Cait got a brand new little sutffy (medic moose) and she loved every second of the ride. She's such a pro with doctors and had no problems with them checking her vitals every few minutes. She just sat there as chill as ever.

When we arrived we were tossed into the busiest ER waiting room I've ever seen (even the paramedics said they've never seen it like this before). My parents met us there and then Ben showed up. And then we wait 6 hours!! Honestly...six...long...hours. The whole time we were there we had a nurse come out and regularly talk to us and check her vitals. So we weren't being ignored by any means...but it still felt like forever.

Finally at 4 in the morning we saw the doctor. She reassured me that they weren't ignoring us, but that because we'd arrived by ambulance and had already been assessed they knew she wasn't in any immediate danger - especially since all her vitals were normal. They also knew that before they'd do any testing they would keep us there for at least 5 hours of observation. This is probably standard procedure, but her medical history also played a roll in this decision. She has been exposed to more radiation that most healthy children in her life. When possible we'll avoid exposing her to any more...so if we don't NEED to do a scan we won't. Basically whether we saw a doctor first or not, we would have been there the same amount of time. Plus we were regularly being monitored by nurses the entire stay. We just weren't in a room. And with it being so busy that night they needed the rooms for other patients. I'm totally fine with that explanation.

Ultimately in the end it turns out she had what was called an impact seizure. Totally benign. The passing out was either a result of the seizure or because she had a breath holding spell (where you hold your breath until you pass out), both of which are normal and not worrisome. After 6 hours of no repeat seizures or loss of consciousness, normal vitals, movement, alertness etc it was safe to say that it was an isolated incident and that there was no brain damage. We didn't need to do any testing or scans on her to confirm this. It was obvious. And I'm grateful for that.

So now we just keep an eye on her and make sure she doesn't fall off so many things. I'm actually quite happy with the care we received even though it was frustrating at the time. Looking back on it I feel like the best decisions were made for her overall health. And I'm just happy that we can walk away from that incident without anything more to worry about. We see enough specialists as it is!