One of Ellie's favorite games for the last month or so has been to help Abby and I with her central line flushes by taking the empty saline syringe and playing with it while we finish hooking her up. She has gotten very good at taking the plunger out, popping off the rubber end in her mouth and spitting it out before she puts the tip-less plunger back in the syringe. Without fail she does her trick and is very happy to play with it while we needed her to be still. Since Ellie doesn't swallow all that much we knew that she would keep spitting out the rubber piece.....
You can probably guess where I am going with this.
We were hooking Ellie up just like we do every night. Flush into the central line, give the flush to Ellie to play with, wipe cap with alcohol, hook up the TPN. Except when it was all done, the rubber piece off of the empty flush was nowhere to be found.
We asked Ellie where the rubber piece was and clear as could be, Ellie pointed to her mouth.
We sat her up and asked again where the rubber piece was. Ellie the pantomimed swallowing and showed us her empty mouth, proud as could be.
It was bound to happen sooner or later. We have been letting Ellie play with the saline flushes after hearing that another family did it. But, for some reason Ellie chose tonight to swallow the piece.
Let's hear it for having a surgeon who is accessible and happy to talk. At 8:45 I called Dr. Jennings at home and told him what had happened. Yes, home with kids running wild in the background and everything he stopped and answered my questions.
Instead of rushing into Children's for 26 tests and an endoscope, which I am sure the on-call resident would have us do, Dr. Jennings asked a couple of questions and told us not to worry.
'It will pass, one way or another. Those things are soft and not very big. Just watch her and watch for the piece. All those tests won't help and might make things worse, anyway.'
Needless to say we will be taking off the rubber piece from now on before giving Ellie the syringe.
Let the ostomy/poop watching begin.
Hopefully we will see a well-traveled rubber disc sometime soon-either out the ostomy or down below.
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2 comments:
Welcome back Karlene! Poor thing - she must have freaked out. Leave it to Ellie ... well, you wanted a kid who loves to eat. She is simply spectacular. My favorite moment this weekend, aside from the coloring and "cooking" and playing in her tent and Kipper marathons, was when, clad all in pink while running around at the Natick mall, she decided to lie down on the floor, just to remind us that she is officially two. I miss her and might watch Kipper tonight in her honor.
Wow Ellie! You sure showed everyone :) Hope you poop is 'productive' soon! ;)
I have been blocked from your site for so long (thank you CHB!) that I wasn't able to send you big HAPPY BIRTHDAY wishes! I thought about you on your day, and am glad to see that you did NOT get your mommy's tummy bug :)
Jessica
www.caringbridge.org/visit/eithenerosehilliard
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