Happy New Year! (First Seizure Episodes)

This day will remain forever etched in our minds.

The holiday season had been filled with sickness for us: stomach flu for most of us and extended family, colds for most of us, 3 cases of pink eye and a strained back (due to vomiting with the stomach flu). We actually came home from celebrating with Dave's family a day early because we just wanted to recover for a day.

After eating lunch, I was holding Teddy while Dave and AJ finished eating. Teddy suddenly went limp and started shaking. I looked at Dave and we were confused as to what was happening. As it continued, we thought it was a seizure but had never experienced one. We called the nurse call line for our insurance to see what to do and were instructed to call 911.

We prepped AJ for the paramedics by telling him some special friends were coming to check on Teddy. When the paramedics arrived, they checked out Teddy, who was mostly back to normal. Since all his vitals were fine, they said we could transport him ourselves.

We headed to the ER with AJ in tow. Dave's folks headed down to pick up AJ, and my mom began the 2.25 hour drive to our place as well. While at the ER, Teddy was kind enough to have another seizure, so we weren't the only ones to witness it.

After scary hours, including debates of whether to send us via ambulance to Children's Hospital in Milwaukee, we were released with a diagnosis of febrile seizures as he had a fever of 100.8°F. The diagnosis didn't quite fit because they typically don't occur until a child is at least 6 months, but we left with the hope that this would be the only time it occurred and a referral to a pediatric neurologist.


And this is the start of us realizing how unique Teddy was ... although this was the tip of the iceberg.

The First Five Months

The first few months after Teddy's birth were fairly uneventful. Our older son AJ adapted well to becoming a big brother, and we all managed just fine despite being tucked tightly into a small duplex. We had moved to Oshkosh from Denmark (Wisconsin) in January 2013 when Dave took a new job. Because we had less than a month to find a place to live, and a house in Denmark to sell, we rented a nice, but small, 2-bedroom duplex. Our hope was to sell our Denmark house and be moved into a new house before Teddy was born. That didn't quite happen since our house didn't sell until right before Teddy was born, and then life happened. We lived in that little duplex for about 19 months, which was at least 12 more than I had intended. Guess what, we all survived.

Teddy's baptism with the Kassie side of the family.

 

Teddy's baptism with the Blondheim side of the family ... juggling cousins!

The biggest issue we encountered was that Teddy was not a happy baby. Although most of the pictures I've included with this post indicate otherwise, he was not all smiles and giggles. In fact, he was more screams and cries.

Brotherly love

It seemed that often he was only content if I walked around carrying him, and he wasn't that tiny of a baby that he got heavy after a while (or so I thought at the time. His current Jan 2016 weight of 35 + lbs. and carrying him now puts that idea of heavy into perspective.) He cried so much that my mother-in-law insisted that he hated her, and we simply told her that Teddy hated life in general, not her specifically.

This was reality most of the time unless Teddy was held while walking around.

I distinctly recall coming home from a late work dinner to find David in the rocking chair with Teddy screaming at the top of his lungs. Once I took him, he settled down, which I know frustrated Dave to no end. (And my stress sky-rocketed from an evening away from the boys only to be greeted by piercing screams.)

That smile, though, was his saving grace.

For whatever reason, around 5 months Teddy magically became a much happier child. He was content to actually chill out on the floor without screaming. He didn't need to be carried everywhere all the time. Life was good ...

Theodore David Blondheim

We welcomed our second son into this world at 1:05 p.m. July 20, 2013. He was one of the relatively few children born on his actual due date, largely because I was induced the day before my due date.

Sleeping babies are so precious!

(I had went more than a week over with my first child, and my OBG wanted me induced within a few days of my due date, so we opted for right before to make it easier for my in-laws to watch our older son over the weekend. I know there's all sorts of arguments to be made about inducing for convenience, etc., but I firmly believe things happened for a reason in my case.)

Although I was considered a high-risk pregnancy due to my Crohns disease, my pregnancy was easy and normal in all the right ways. (That means I gained too much weight and ate everything I wanted, which I swore I wouldn't do again the second time around.) I did have additional ultrasounds, which showed no concerns. I was rather excited when I had an ultrasound a few days before my due date with an estimated weight of 8 lb. 3 oz. I thought there was a good chance my second baby would be smaller than my 8 lb. 12 oz. firstborn.

The first captured smile of many smiles ... once we got through the screaming phase that lasted the first 5 months.

My second experience giving birth was easier than my first, as I was relatively comfortable most of the overnight whereas I had been in a lot of pain through the whole night with my first son. My husband and I joked it was a date for us to watch Kung Fu Panda II without toddler interruptions.

Things got more intense the following morning, with the contractions becoming much more painful. I felt like a wild Amazonian woman screaming through them in the oddest positions. Although I do pregnancy just fine, the childbirth part isn't where I'm composed and ladylike. The doctor and nurses kept a close eye on my contractions because the baby's heartbeat dropped when I had contractions. I had hoped to get through without an epidural and was reconsidering it partially for pain. They called for the anesthesiologist, and when he arrived I could barely hold still for him to get me marked. At that point, before the needle was inserted, I said that I couldn't not push.

Obviously all the nurses said I wasn't supposed to be pushing but said they'd check me. Once they checked me, they were calling for the doctor, scrambling to get the room ready and the anesthesiologist was fleeing the room because he didn't want to be the only doctor in the room when the baby appeared. In the midst of the chaos, an oxygen hose got disconnected from the wall, so there was a rushing of oxygen until the staff got it recapped.

My doctor appeared, and our child was welcomed into our world less than 5 minutes (and 3 pushes, one of which I wasn't supposed to do) after I was being prepped for an epidural.

I don't know if I realized at the time how close I was to an emergency C-section. I think had I been able to get the epidural and not been ready to push, that's what would have happened because of the repeated dropping heart rate.

Our little boy was a whopping 9 lb. 3 oz. (so much for that ultrasound being remotely accurate!) and 21 inches, the same length as his brother. But what wasn't the same was the fact that he was blue. His heart rate kept fluctuating because his umbilical cord was wrapped around his neck and kept choking him each time I had a contraction. He was still breathing and pinked up some right away when they got the cord off his neck. I kept calling him a Smurf baby, but the doctors and nurses didn't seem too concerned. He did fine on all his Apgar scores and became completely normal in color within about 2 days.

Little boy blue.

We had picked the name Theodore for a boy (and Sierra Anne for a girl), largely after Teddy Roosevelt. We were undecided on middle name when we entered the hospital. My husband wanted David, named after himself and his father. I wanted Michael, named after my dad, particularly since we had no part of names from my side of the family. As we were filling out the paperwork, I conceded to my husband with the agreement that my family's names would be included in our third.

We took him home from the hospital in the 0-3 outfit (as there was no way newborn would have fit him) and welcomed our Teddy Bear into our family.

This little boy gets lots of bear clothes because he's Teddy Bear.