23 November 2014
On Friday 21 November 2014 the wife and I noticed how little dear child had consumed in the way of food and drink over the course of the day. We decided that his cold symptoms were causing him problems, so we gave him some milk and them some calpol. Around ten-thirty minutes later he was vomiting. We quickly cleaned him up. This cycled happened three times.
By Saturday 22 November we realised we should get some professional advice and rang 111, the out of hours number for GP services. They told us an appointment had been made for us at the local hospital (St. Marys). The doctor diagnosed a ear and throat infection. We had to restrain dear child whilst his ears and throat were looked in and temperature was taken. This was distressing for all of us. He gave a prescription for Amoxicillin and away we went.
On Sunday 23 November we were quite tired from the late night at out of hours with dear child. We woke up, started to feed dear child and then once he finished we realised he had a dirty nappy. Dear wife went downstairs to prepare a syringe of calpol(tm) [other brands are available] whilst I did the nappy change.
I placed dear child on the changing table and removed his pyjamas then nappy and started to clean him up. As I wiped I noticed just how red his testicles were. They looked inflamed an as red as strawberries, and even worse was the sounds he made when I lightly cleaned off the muck. I knew something was wrong and called dear wife to take a look too. We both decided to take him to A&E immediately, he’s obviously unwell, his testes could be infected, hence the redness, and its must be quite advanced to cause such a nasty looking red.
We bundled dear child into the car at 0900 and off we went to RBH A&E. We got parked at 1010 and headed into the A&E Paediatric department. We waited some time before the Triage nurse looked at dear child. She didn’t think there was too much up with him and said that we could go to Westcall, where the queue would be shorter. So, we stupidly took this advice and walked over to the maternity block and went to Westcall.
We later find that we have to sit through a waiting room of people before another Triage nurse takes another look at dear child. She has not seen this before and suggests we put a bag over his penis and testicles to catch any urine which may be needed for later analysis. We go along with this idea and dear child is placed on the urgent list.
After another long wait of over two hours we finally get to see the doctor. The doctor takes a look at him and after a few minutes says that he needs to be admitted. The doctor tells us they will send a letter to the Paediatrics doctor and we will be able to go straight through Paediatric A&E.
We go back to A&E and talk to the receptionist. Turns out we can’t go straight through, even with a letter, we have to be assessed, again. At this point I try and avoid having a moan, but it’s all seeming a bit insane to me.
So we wait. We wait and we wait and we wait. Around 16:00 we finally get to see the Doctor, again. This time a different doctor though. Saw the doctor, went to the ward, finally. Doctor said to water challenge him. This means trying to get as much fluid into him as possible every ten minutes. The doctor also said that dear child had an infection in the scrotal area, which by now was bleeding.
The bag was removed and we were told that when he goes to the ward he should be left naked whilst we water challenge him. The bag is taken away for analysis.
We get walked around the hospital, first to Dolphin ward, then to Lion’s ward where we finally come to rest. The nurses all think that its a simple task to feed him water. They get to see just how hard it is to try and force him. Now, I’ve had to get vitamin k into chickens, and that was a simple task compared to getting dear child to take some sugar water.
After much trying we get small amounts into him, but he doesn’t pass any urine. We remain on the ward, battling with dear child to try and get him to drink. It is no simple task. We tried to get him to drink some whole milk from a bottle, he refuses this too.
We struggle on. We get some antibiotics into him around 2000.
Dear child wants to get some sleep so he burrows his head into the mattress with his bum on display for the ward to look up to and worship like an ancient brown eyed nymph.
One of the interesting things about antibiotics is that it often gives one a wobbly belly.
We wake dear child around 2010 for his next feed.
It is a long process, but eventually a doctor comes round and we finally get some sense. The doctor explains that the inflammation is due to a surface infection on the testes. He explains that the antibiotics will help this infection but probably not his overall symptoms. Finally some sense to put us at ease. It is around this time that dear child’s bum also gives in and there is the sound of the Earth ripping open whilst he breaks wind and the Thames flood barrier is breached letting forth a torrent of diarrhoea.
To clean up dear child we put him in the cot bed on a mattress protector. Again he breaks wind making a puddle of mud. He breaks wind again, sending spatter around the cot. Not one side escaped the punishment. It is a miracle how mummy and daddy escaped the brutality.
Finally around 2200 we get some wee out of him and request leave.