Febrile Seizure on July 22, 2018

James came down with a cold on Saturday, July 21. On July 22, he had a fever. We decided to not bring him to church that morning due to his sickness. He spent some quality time with his Grandpa Grayson Child.

Throughout the day, he was loopy, running around sporadically and not making sense when he spoke. We knew he was sick with his cough and his stuffed up nose. When we put him to bed that evening, he had a low grade fever, nothing out of the ordinary.

He woke up that evening around 9:30 p.m. shivering. We gave him some children's ibuprofen to help out.

At 10:45, he awoke again, shivering uncontrollably, we knew it was bad. Erica tried to give him some coughing medicine. Before he could swallow half of it, he threw up all over Erica, and he kept throwing up. We knew that was a very bad sign. He still shook, crying, coughing. We took his temp, it was 101 degrees. Erica tried to help him, hold him, sing to him, and just make sure he was comfortable. 15 minutes later, his fever spiked to 104 degrees. We were so confused, we thought the thermometer had malfunctioned. We took his temp again, same reading. Erica had been on the phone trying to get a hold of his pediatrician, or someone in the medical field to help us know what to do. Right after, James' eyes began to role to the back of his head. Erica and I were shocked, we had no idea what was going on. Erica's mother, Malinda, screamed "He's having a seizure"! and grabbed James out of Erica's arms and took him to the sink to splash cold water on him. James was not breathing. Erica's sister Madison began performing CPR.

I called 9-1-1 and told the operator James was having a seizure and the address of my location. I was terrified. James was turning white in the face and blue in the lips. He had lost all color to his complexion. The 9-1-1 specialist told us to put James on the floor (hard surface) and to make sure his airway was free and tilt his head upward. At this point, the first Police Officer arrived, thankfully James began coughing again. Minutes later, the ambulance and fire fighters came in. They made sure James was breathing and stable. We decided Erica should go with James in the ambulance while I took everyone else in the car and followed them to the closest hospital, Presbyterian Allen.

Erica holding James in our living room as she prepares to go to the hospital.

We arrived at the hospital just before midnight. James was delirious and scared. He had nurses and doctors putting things on him and poking him. They tried to insert a needle for a saline solution in his hands three times but couldn't get his vain. One time, the needle went straight through his upper hand, through his skin and out the other. The hospital finally made the decision to try his arm. Thankfully that worked. Of course, throughout the entire process, James was thanking the nurses, mentioning how everything that beeped and had a laser on it was "So beautiful" and said "Let's go home" every time the door to his room opened.

The team did a blood test, and needed a urine sample before he could be discharged. The blood sample was taken when they inserted an IV into James' arm, however we had to wait for the urine, as he was not potty trained yet. So we waited, and waited and waited. James fell asleep around 3 a.m. and we were hoping that he wouldn't need a catheter and have more discomfort and pain with this trip to the ER. Finally, the doctor came in and convinced us to have him get a catheter. We agreed, but as we waited for the nurse to come in with it, we again decided we didn't want to see him in pain again, and asked that we wait a little longer. Less than 10 minutes later, James had given a urine sample, and they were able to send it off to the labs.

The good news is that everything turned up negative. However, we learned of the scary reality of febrile seizures that evening. James has a 30% chance of having another seizure in his youth. A febrile seizure, while scary, most febrile seizures produce no lasting effects. Simple febrile seizures don't cause brain damage, intellectual disability or learning disabilities, and they don't mean James has a serious underlying disorder. We also found that febrile seizures can be genetic, and we found out that James' uncle (Erica's brother) had four febrile seizures growing up.

We were finally discharged from the hospital at 5 a.m. that morning. Erica and I did not get to sleep at all while there, and we only slept for a couple of hours after getting home. It's important to note during all of this, that when we were discharged, Erica's due date was the very next day. She was admitted to the hospital less than 48 hours later to deliver our second child. You can read more about that in the next blog.

We were thankful that James was able to heal (he was bouncing off the walls and back to his normal self) within a couple of days, but the evening of July 22 and 23 was probably one of the scariest nights we have ever gone through as a married couple and as parents.

Discharged at 5 a.m.