so they sent a tech up to attach the EEG electrodes and he began attaching them. hayden was screaming and passed out at LEAST 8 times during the hour long process for a couple seconds each time. i called for a nurse and they sent the dr in. she asked who witnessed it (that was the first question she asked as tho she didn't believeme!) and then left. a nurse didn't even stay in the room to help if it happened again! so after he was hooked up and after all those episodes, he fell asleep. the test was supposed to be 2 hours long but since he was asleep, they wanted to leave him on it for 24 hours so they could get awake and asleep. they said they noticed he only had episodes when he was awake, so they wanted plenty of awake recording. after a miserable night of tossing and turning for him and arguing with the nurses for me, we began a new day. he was furious about having little room to move and with all the electrodes on his head, it was hard to play! the electrodes were glued to his head and he kept pulling at them, ripping patches of his hair out. he was miserable and they had plenty of awake reading, so i asked them to take him off. they decided they wanted to leave him on until he had an episode and who knew how long it would be before that would happen!
a bit later, we were cuddling on the fold out chair in his room and i changed his diaper. he was laying on hisback and i was tickling him. then he went limp again. this time his eyes just went blank instead of rolling back. he stopped breathing and i started screaming for the nurse and yelling his name trying to get him to wake up. i started hitting his chest trying to jar him awake, but it wasn't working. finally, he started to come to again. i was so relieved they finally caught an episode on EEG and they had even set up a video camera in our room so it was on video too! i paged my nurse and they unhooked him from the EEG and sent the results off to be downloaded. he slept for hours again after this episode. the neurologist finally came up and sat me down to talk.
he explained to me that hayden definetely went limp suddenly and the monitors showed his heart rate immediately dropped from 140's down to the 80's at the exact same time. they said he wasn't breathing for around 20 seconds and that there was some abnormal marks on his EEG. they said that after a year old, a baby's brain will have waves simultaneously on both sides, but that haydens was having waves isolated to one side at a time. he said there were some unexplained marks, but that none of these things had anything to do with his episodes. now here's where it all gets utterly ridiculous! he told me they were diagnosing hayden with breath holding spells. they said he feels neglected andunloved and that he's holding his breath for attention and making himself pass out so that i will rescue him. putting a lot of stock into a 20 month old, huh? and doesn't make sense because my son is a very happy and well adjusted baby! he also had my full attention and was cuddled during EVERY attack except the two he had in the car. he didn't hold his breath either before he passed out. he went limp and stopped breathing at the exact same time! but they reccomended i take him to a child psychologist to help him deal with his feelings and give in to everything he wants. they said don't let him cry or get upset. and here's the scariest part...they said if he has another episode, i was supposed to lay him on the floor and don't look at him or talk to him or touch him! let him lie there for 2 minutes because if i give him attention for doing it, he will keep doing it!!! i can't for the life of me think of a dumber idea than that!
so they sent us home and we haven't had another episode since then, but I was so terrified because i KNEW that wasn't what was happening, i began to do some research online. i found this seizure disorder called RAS that fits so perfectly all his symptoms and even says is commonly misdiagnosed as simple breathholding. i called the dr and we have an appt tomorow to see what he thinks and to get a referral to another neurologist. so that's our saga and hopefully we can get some real answers soon!
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