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'Just Your Daily 9-1-1 Emergency. ...': Special Needs Parenting 101. by Karen Lynn Vidra, The Texas Tornado
Friday, January 25, 2013
Rated "G" by the Author.
A family deals with their child, who happens to be medically fragile. This is their story.
I wonder what today will bring to our family.
I wonder if we can get through today without a call to the hospital, requesting for an ambulance or medical advice.
I wonder if we can get through a day without spiking (or dropping) respiratory (or heart) rates, beeping or chiming alarms, unexpected leaks of various kinds, or accidental detachment from ventiators or feeding apparatuses.
Somehow I don't see that happening. *Sigh!*
We have a little boy named Eannon (Ean) Nathaniel. He is only two years old but he has already put us through more in his two years on this earth than we have experienced throughout all our lifetime. He was born with multiple medical problems that have required frequent hospital stays, surgeries, doctor's visits, and appointments with specialists, therapists, and whatnot.
At the age of two, he is ventilator dependent (he has a trache which we connect the respirator apparatus to), tube-fed (via his belly; it's called a gastro-tube; it was surgically placed when he was about six months old), unable to walk (doctors don't think he will ever walk; his legs are far too weak), and cannot talk (obviously due to the tube in his airway). Doctors aren't sure whether Eannon will ever be free from all of this medical equipment.
Eannon has been in and out of the hospital since his birth (mostly in); he was in for six months after he was born (he weighed less than 14 ounces); when he isn't in the hospital, nurses care for him around the clock if we, his parents cannot do it (my wife works two jobs; I work as well). We have had some bad experiences in the past with some nurses, but now we have nurses whom we trust and nurses who have gotten to know Eannon (and his needs) very well. They are very good with him.
Yet we can be expected to get a call from our nurses about Eannon any time we are not home. His health is just too precarious; anything can (and often does) happen. It's nice to get away, but not so nice whenever we think about what could happen to our son and whether the day will bring another trip to the local hospital ER or God forbid, another hospital stay.
There's been so many times we have nearly lost Eannon we've lost count. I'm surprised he's managed to live this long; it just goes to show you how tough we McKinnon men really are, even in the person of our son, who is the last person you'd expect to fight as hard as he's done ever since day one.
Every day, my prayer is the same: if it is His will, to let Eannon survive another day. It's no wonder that age thirty five both my wife's and my hair have turned prematurely grey. We both know that it is not Eannon's fault, but such is the life when you have a child like our son.
Just keep us (and especially Eannon) in your prayers; we really could use a break or better yet, a bona fide miracle from God Himself! We would both greatly appreciate it!
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