Jonathan in the ER

Today was another day in the ER.  Jonathan was suppose to have his skin testing done today but he got sick, probably from not being on his normal antihistamines.  He might have a sinus infection.  His ears were plugged and pressurized along with swollen and puffy sinuses under his eyes.  He also had a low-grade fever and was vomiting the whole afternoon.  He was severely dizzy all day and was in lots of pain.  The allergist wanted us to reschedule his skin testing for when he was feeling better.

I gave him some Excedrin to see if he had a migraine which is common for him.  He started feeling much better after an hour or two.  After about 2 hours after taking the Excedrin he felt his chest tighten and found it was hard to swallow.  I grabbed his EpiPen from the bedroom, but by the time I got back he couldn't swallow any liquids anymore.  I looked at his tongue and it was about the size of a clementine.  I gave him his EpiPen and we sped off to the ER.

 

I don't especially like Conroe Regional Hospital so we went to Physician's ER, a free-standing ER over by our movie theater at 6 PM.  They took him right back while I filled out all the paperwork.  They gave him the allergy trifecta (steroids-pepcid-benadryl) and let him rest a little bit.  He started feeling better and his throat swelling was starting to come down.  They later gave him some Ativan because he had a high pulse and blood pressure; once they gave him that he started to fall asleep.  An hour later they discharged him with some more prescriptions.  We dropped off the scripts at Walgreens and grabbed some grub because we were both starving, and got home at 9:30 PM.

While Jonathan was talking to the doctors I called his allergist and had a very frank discussion with the head nurse on call and the allergist.  We discussed his symptoms he had today.  The nurse said that all his symptoms he had earlier are factors of having an allergic reaction, but since they are so non-specific they could be confused for an infection.  They called in an antibiotic for him to take just in case.  After that we discussed the rescheduling of his skin testing.  I was making sure to reiterate to the nurse that I did not want to have Jonathan be off his antihistamines for another 5 days and have this same thing happen all over again.  She got the doctor on the line and we discussed the possibility of doing a blood test for allergines but he does not prefer that.  We rescheduled his skin testing for this Friday at 9:30 AM.  He will have to be on Prednisone for the next couple of days, not being able to take antihistamines still.  They are going to do a control skin test first to make sure that the antihistamines the ER gave him are out of his system; once he passes that test they will either do or not do the skin testing.

This will be reaction number 3 in the past 3 weeks.  It has been completely frustrating not knowing answers or anything.  Jonathan will now have missed a week's worth of work.  He is hopefully going to be getting off Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday.  We are still praying for answers and to not get frustrated with the puzzle solving process.  The medical bills are certainly climbing after 3 ER visits, 4 Allergist visits, 1 Ambulance, plus my medical visits this past month added in.  It will be a rough month or two for the income, and it doesn't help that since its the summer I don't receive paychecks from SHSU until school starts.  Oh brother......

We are a little overwhelmed, concerned, and will continue to pray for Jonathan's health and wellness.  I'm pretty sure that Walgreens is tired of seeing my face picking up prescriptions....they know my last name now when I walk up!

Keep your prayers coming!!