When it rains...it pours with our Mason

Mason has been through the ringer this last week, and I just wanted to document and update those that still follow this blog with the whole story. These things always happen when Mike is away, he was in Germany for some training classes he needed.
Mason's story starts April 27th. I woke up to the scariest sight I have ever woken up too, Mason covered in blood. He was screaming at about 5am and I ran in there because it is the kind of scream that puts your hair on end. I found blood all over him, the bed, the pillow etc..and had no idea what happened or how it happened. After the blood subsided and he settled down a bit I was able to figure out that the blood was from his tongue which had a bite mark and was swollen. The bite mark was far in the back and very hard to see. He settled down with a movie and ate some frozen yogurt tubes and seemed to feel much better. He headed out the door when his taxi came for school, and I thought to myself, "I'm glad he wanted to go and also that the tongue wasn't as bad as the blood lead me to believe."
Unfortunately I got a call from the school telling me Mason was crying and wouldn't settle down with anything. So I went, got him, and took him the ER to see what was going on. His tongue had become so swollen that it was sitting over his teeth on the left side and he was just screaming in pain. They let me know there wasn't much they could do for tongue lacerations and that he could take Tylenol/Motrin rotating and it should heal quite quickly. So we went home, he took the meds and we had Popsicles heaven going on in our home. I bought many Popsicles, but he wouldn't eat very many of those. So Saturday came, the 28th, and he was moaning and sad, but ate a Popsicle and the swelling had gone down quite a bit. At this point the doctors and myself were suspecting that he had a seizure and that is how he damaged his tongue so badly. Although this wasn't confirmed, we didn't know how else he could have hurt it as badly as it was.
The following Tuesday he actually ate some rice for dinner and we thought we were headed for recovery. Thursday we took a turn for the worse, he came home from school and was back to moaning and not eating anything at all. He was chewing on towels and was in pain with the tongue again. So I gave him meds and we did the best we could to make him happy. He didn't sleep a wink Thursday night because he would fall asleep and then startle awake because his tongue touched his teeth or moved a bit. Friday morning he was crying and couldn't be comforted, the meds doing nothing for him. I took him back to the ER to hopefully have them look at it, and give him stronger pain meds. Mason was seen by the worst bedside manner, least caring doctor I have ever met, and I've met a lot of doctors. As a side note, he was not military, but was a civilian they sometimes hire to fill positions. I just didn't want our military docs getting a bad rep. He sat during our visit with Mason, who was crying in pain, glanced in his tongue while he was crying and said yes, it is hurt. He then looked at me and said, "this is just going to be a trial of patience for you." NEVER tell a mom that has had about an average of 3 hours of sleep, none the night before that she is being tested in patience--just don't do that. We got sent home with Tylenol/Codeine and the instruction to eat as many Popsicles as he wanted etc.. Mason came home and was eating one Popsicle after another and chewing on towels, but even the heavier meds were not helping. He was still bleeding and had been since 9am. However, until he is bleeding 'cups' of blood with no identification of drool mixed in then they don't worry.
Hours of crying, drooling, bleeding, and at our wits end I called and spoke with a brother in our ward who is also a doctor. We finally concluded that the only way to get Mason to stop chewing on his tongue (which he wouldn't stop doing) was to sedate him as best we could. So I gave Mason some of his emergency seizure meds to knock him out. That with the codeine, and his melatonin he finally fell asleep.
At this point I had been able to see his tongue and realized that he was chewing a hole through the top and was actually concerned that he would chew it off if given enough time. Mason fell asleep at 8:30pm on that Friday night and woke up at 1am moaning in pain again. The codeine could be given every 4-6 hours, so I went to get more and see if that would help. When I touched Mason to give him his meds I realized with a start that we had a more serious problem on our hands. I got his temp, and when 105 degrees popped up there I knew we were headed back to the hospital. Luckily I have wonderful caring friends and someone was able to come and be with the kids.
We got to the ER and Mason was herded right in and an IV started with some fluids to help with dehydration. They tried with all their might to see his tongue, but he wouldn't open his mouth wide enough for them to see if that was our source of infection. His blood work had come back and we knew there was infection somewhere. They suspected that the tongue had got infected somehow and were going off of that to start some antibiotics. We were being admitted to start the antibiotics because I knew that taking Mason home was not going to work and if we were dealing with fevers I wanted him at the hospital in case seizures started.
When they went to do his vitals one last time in the ER before moving him upstairs his O2 levels were very low. This was a new development and they didn't understand why that was the case. They tried different fingers to get the oxygen levels read, but he was staying at 82/83--which is not good. So they started him on oxygen and were able to get him up to 95 with the oxygen blowing at 15 ltrs. (which is as much as they can give you) With this problem they came and listened to his lungs again and then decided a chest x-ray was needed. Mason was so out of it, so weak that he was allowing the oxygen mask, and allowed us to move him around while they did the x-ray. This is what worried me the most, he wasn't fighting us anymore. When they got the x-ray back they found he had pneumonia from aspiration. The doctors normally see this kind of thing in drunks who have vomited and swallowed that down into their lungs--apparently it is very rare to see this in children. Leave it to Mason to get something rare--he always does!
We were moved upstairs and they were keeping him on oxygen and he was pretty much just laying there sleeping the whole day. They sedated him somewhat so that they could get into his mouth and have a good look at the tongue to see if there was anything that needed to be done. The dentist, oral surgeon, and pediatrician were there during this. I got a good look at the tongue at this time and just felt sick and so sad for my little man who had this horrible hole in the the top of his tongue and an ulcer that had developed and was about the size of a dime on the side and into the bottom of his tongue. They literally can do nothing for this thing and just have to let it heal on its own. They gave us some mouth wash to help with the build up of dead cells and he was placed on a 'no chewing' diet. Saturday night went okay and Mason was finally aware enough to fight having his oxygen mask on. Luckily he was keeping his O2 levels up to 93 at this point, and they were happy with him leaving the mask off. He was throwing up a lot of mucus that night-which was a good sign to the pneumonia clearing out of his system. He was released on Sunday night with the hope that he would eat better and move around a bit more at home.
Today Mason is doing much better than he was, he is slowly but surely getting back to himself. Mike was able to come home on a medical emergency early release. Mason actually ate some real food while we were at the base today for his follow-up appt and that alone makes me smile!! He also laughed as he was watching a movie--which is also a sure sign that he is getting better.
A HUGE thank you to all those who stayed with my other kids, came to save me in the middle of the night, have brought meals, food and helped out with school runs/pick-ups etc. The amount of help has been amazing and I am so grateful for a wonderful support system!!