Well, I guess that Tegan wasn't doing as well as I thought she was. Even though she was drinking so much, she still wasn't able to catch herself up. She continued to have diarrhea, so she was just too far behind on her fluids. She started looking better, but she started acting worse. She just couldn't keep her eyes open and was very lazy. She would just lay there through anything I did to her.

I just felt like something was wrong, so I took her back into the doctor. Thank goodness too, because she was very messed up. If I hadn't taken her in that day, she might have gotten so bad that she could have had a seizer or gone in to a coma. The doctor could tell something wasn't right and had me take her over to have blood drawn.

The results showed that her sodium was way too high. It was so high, they thought it was a mistake. So, we had to go to the ER here in Mt. Vernon. They tested her again and it wasn't a mistake. The on-call pediatrician wasn't sure exactly how to fix it, so she had us sent down to Children's in Seattle just to be safe. We had to take an ambulance because she had to be on IV fluids on the drive.

We sat in the ER down at Children's forever. The hospital was full and they even had to turn some kids away to different hospitals. They admitted us because we had to go to the ICU. It took a long time for them to get the bed open for Tegan.

Once they got us up there they wanted to start taking her blood to test the sodium every two hours so they had to put an IV into a bigger vein so they could drawn the blood without poking her every time. The problem was that they couldn't get the IV in because all her veins were too small. Finally when the new doctor came on shift, he got one in a vein in her groin.

They had to bring her sodium level down very slowly so that it didn't mess with her chemicals too much. She also had metabolic acidosis...which basically means that her body's chemicals were so low on water that they couldn't work just right and were creating too much acid.

So, it was all very serious, but since she was being taken care of, we didn't have to worry anymore. We were so thankful that we got it figured out in time. She stayed at the hospital for 3 days while they gave her fluids. She was fixed by the second day, but they had us stay one more night to make sure she could handle things on her own by drinking and eating enough.

She is back to her normal happy self again! Come to find out that the virus she had that gave her the stomach flu was called the rotavirus. It is a sneaky virus because it can stay alive on surfaces for up to a few days. That means that you have to be VERY careful to wash hands. At the hospital I had to wear a gown and gloves to be by her. That was so I could remove those items before I left her room so I didn't take the virus anywhere else in the hospital. I bet that is the virus that everyone around here is getting!

Through all this Kelby did just fine. She didn't even seem to be bother by the hospital when she came to visit. I don't think she remembers being there. She was a good big sister. Gramma and Grampa Wright watched a lot while Mike worked and I was at the hospital. Kelby had a great time I think.

I better go get some things done so I can get caught up on things around here. We love you all. Thanks for continuing to check-up on my family!