Our Big Hospital Adventure

We live FAR away from a hospital. This is something that keeps me on my toes. It dictates certain aspects of our lives - like not playing extreme sports, that's something people near hospitals can do, not us. One of my worst nightmares is having to rush out in the middle of the night to make the very long trip to the hospital, especially if I'm going there because something is wrong with my son. Two hours to get to a hospital, when you are scared for your child's life, seems like eternity.

Our week started out like any other week

 with a very productive Monday -

Lots of work with Probability in Math Class

 Vocabulary and Spelling 

with games instead of worksheets =

much more fun.

We started using the very effective method

of covering fingertips in aloe vera goo to stop nail-biting. 

It is really doing the trick. Soooo bitter.

Lu finished his book on Ancient Egypt.

We learned lattice multiplication.

I'd never learned it. It's great!

And Lu loves how much easier it is than the old way -

much clearer, and less mixing up carried numbers.

Why didn't they teach me this in school????

Then he sat down to his research report on Hawks...

and that's when the headache started.

So I thought we would take a little break

by throwing a blanket down on the floor,

closing our eyes, 

and listening to some Chopin.

And call it Music Appreciation Class.

After 20 minutes, the piece ended,

and I opened my eyes to find a very asleep Lu next to me,

which was strange because he's not a napper.

When he finally woke up, he wanted to go straight to bed.

The headache was bad. He didn't even want to eat.

On Tuesday morning he didn't want to get out of bed.

The headache got stronger and stronger.

I started thinking about meningitis.

We're hours away from the nearest emergency room,

so things like meningitis and appendicitis 

make me especially jumpy.

I looked at the meningitis checklist,

called a doctor friend to see what he thought.

He said it would be best to go.

I packed a bag, 

Cha called us a driver - cars are obsolete around here

because everything is so close, so we don't have one.

But there are lots of local drivers with cars

who can get us where we need to go - 

a pricey, but not impossibly, service.

We left our house at 3pm

and arrived at the hospital at 5pm.

I'm not going to go into too much detail about 

the conditions in Guatemalan public hospitals.

I'll just say that we were in one big room 

with a dozen other children, 

many of whom were screaming in pain, 

and there were blood stains on the sheet 

covering Lu's hospital bed.

I really don't like being in hospitals.

We were there for a total of 10 hours.

There was no chair for me to sit on.

By 11:30pm we knew it was not meningitis.

The headaches were being caused by sinusitis.

He was okay.

Phew!

But we still couldn't go home,

because being on a Guatemalan highway

at midnight, is not where you want to be.

I squeezed into the hospital bed with Lu a few times,

my butt hanging off the side,

and even got a bit of sleep.

We waited until 3am to leave, 

and were home by 5am. Wednesday.

Lu spent the rest of the day in bed.

By Thursday (yesterday) morning,

the antibiotics kicked in and Lu was able to 

participate in his Youth Group's special activity

for the mothers.

The kids danced and recited poems for us,

and then we all played games together -

mothers and children,

it was lovely.

Today is Friday and I still feel dazed

from our big hospital adventure.

But I am grateful, so so grateful, that this was the first time in his almost decade of life, that I have ever had to take Lu to a hospital. Having to rush off to an emergency room 2 hours away when accidents happen is one of my biggest fears, as well as one of the biggest downsides of living where we live. We do all we can to keep healthy with natural medicine and preventative measures - safety, healthy diet, good hygiene... We also try to avoid antibiotics as much as we can. But when you really do need a doctor and an antibiotic, it's so good to have them. 

Happy weekend!

We'll be taking it real easy.