A trip to the ER

Last weekend was fantastic - crazy, but fantastic. I had art in Sam's class on Friday, family arriving Friday afternoon, Sam's baptism on Saturday, we were the musical number for the baptism, I had to speak in church on Sunday, and Ted had to teach the fifth Sunday lesson for the men and women on Sunday (luckily he had some help from his parents speaking about missionary work). It was a packed weekend, but it was great. Monday morning I was determined to get back on top of things I had put off for a while.

We had gymnastics for Tessa, had to do some grocery shopping, pick up a few last minute things for Tessa's birthday, and then we made some birthday treats for Tessa's school. While we were making the treats she asked in a very matter of fact tone, "will you hand me that cup, my legs hurt and I can't walk." Yeah, right. What mom hasn't heard that before? I'm sure if it were candy her legs would be working just fine, right? I blew off the comment.

An hour later she said the same thing to Ted. Then she accidentally got bumped into and had to take a few steps and started screaming. Ted tried to pick her up and she was screaching that it hurt for her to be picked up. I tried picking her up and she did the same thing. This was no tantrum, this was her real cry. When we pulled her pants up to look her knees were huge. They were hot to the touch and were very swollen. When I set her down she couldn't walk. Her legs were just aching, but if we held her the right way where nothing touched her legs she would stop crying, but the slightest touch to them sent her into fits.

We dropped what we were doing and headed to the emergency room (because as is the case with every emergency it happens after doctor's offices have closed). She was a pro. She was calm, collected, and actually pleasant once we had her in the wheelchair so we weren't bumping her knees on accident.

The ER doctor initially thought she had broken her legs and went into a lengthy discussion about how this happens a lot when older kids jump on trampolines with younger kids. He ordered x-rays of her knees. As they came in to take the x-rays we noticed that she was starting to break out in a rash all over, and her knees looked like they had horrible bruises all over them. We asked them to call the doctor back to see all of this and he then canceled the order for the x-rays saying this was something else. He said it was Henoch-Schonlein-Purpura. He then told us not to look it up when we got home because we would freak out.

When we got home we looked it up.

But we didn't freak out. He had prepped us with what to expect. I was a little frustrated because he said to come back if we saw excessive amounts of blood in her urine or stools. How much is excessive???? He said she would be dramatically worse the next several days and that the bruises would last for several days to weeks. However, we weren't to worry, it would be fine.

It was fine. The next day she was fine. Her knees were still swollen and a little warm, but the rash was gone, the bruises were gone, and most importantly she was walking. It was a happy surprise since it was her birthday. We did have to go and draw blood for some further tests, but she is fine. The blood tests showed inflammation, and indicated some sort of viral infection in her blood, but she seems fine now. Other than that, it is a mystery.

However, Tessa has learned a valuable lesson. She has learned that all she has to say is, "my legs hurt" and mama comes running. She's also getting a crash course in telling the truth so mama doesn't flip out.