Sorta a Nightmare

I have this fear that something is going to happen to one of my boys. They are fine, but I am paranoid so I have this fear. I also have the type of personality that jumps to the worst possible conclusion really quickly… Brian is late coming home, must have been a car accident, Michael has the sniffles, must be Ebola, you get the idea. So when something happened to sweet new Zach you can imagine where my mind went. Here’s what happened.

About 2 weeks ago the remnants of Zach’s umbilical cord fell off. I didn’t think much about it, everything seemed sorta normal, until it wasn’t. There was a yellow blob in the middle of his belly button and it was oozing (I guess I shoulda warned you this would be graphic). When we went to the pediatrician I asked her about it and she said it was called a granuloma and it would go away, but she put some silver nitrate on it just in case. The oozing continued and it didn’t go away, but it didn’t get worse so I didn’t need to take him in.  None of the warning signs had occurred, it wasn’t swollen, bleeding, didn’t have a smell, and didn’t seem to bother Zach in the slightest. So I cleaned it, and only worried a little bit. Then all of a sudden his belly button doubled in size, then tripled, and quadrupled, all in just a few hours. Now I was worried. I called the pediatrician and explained the problem and when in that day. I assumed she would just put silver nitrate on it again, and it would be good. So we go to the appointment, they weigh him (he weighs 11lbs 11oz now, he is trying to double his birth weight before 2 months) and then the pediatrician comes in. She takes one look at him and get concerned. He didn’t have a fever, was happy, was clearly gaining weight, had good color, was responsive, no ear infection,  etc, all in all he was healthy except the belly button issue. Now I am concerned, if the pediatrician is concerned I am concerned. She says she will be right back, so she’s gone about 5 minutes (enough time for me to really start to panic) and then comes back. She tells me she thinks he has an umbilical hernia and that it isn’t anything to worry about, but because the granuloma is obstructing her view she can’t tell. She then tells me his intestines could be poking through his belly button causing the oozing or something else horrible, but that she wouldn’t bet on it in Vegas… ok…  Then she tells me she called her friend the pediatric surgeon and we have an appointment at Children’s at 1pm (it was 10am). Our pediatrician talks really fast so this conversation was about 1 minute (don’t get me wrong I love our pediatrician and I am sad to leave her when we go to Austin). By the end my head was spinning, was there something wrong with Zach, did I just just notice he was hurt, was he seriously ill? Would he be ok? As these thoughts are going through my mind she tells me that he may have to have a same day surgery or something else but that we will be at the hospital so they are equipped to deal with that. Zach is exactly 1 month old (ok he was one month and a day), hearing there could be something potentially life threatening wrong with your one month old is enough to make anyone worry, but someone who invents the worst case scenarios, lets just say I was concentrating on breathing at the point.

So we go to the surgeon’s office and as we are waiting there other patents come in… patients that have had surgeries for various reasons and my only thought was please don’t let this be my child. All the children had received surgeries for what appeared to be obvious issues, I don’t think I am equipped to deal with a child in that much pain, it was too heartbreaking. So they call us in, the nurse starts taking Michael’s vitals until he tells her he is Michael and not Zach. Then we see the nurse practitioner, she looks at Zach, pokes him, and tells us she is pretty sure he has a hernia, then she pokes it back in… She says it isn’t anything to worry about but that she is going to get the surgeon to double check. At this point my heart rate was slowing down (a bit). The surgeon comes in, glances at him, and says it is an umbilical hernia, nothing to worry about, he wont operate until Zach is 4 unless it causes issues, and more than likely it will close up soon. He then says that the pediatrician saw another patient in her practice last week who had a similar issue but with complications and that she was probably just paranoid and sent us for that reason. At this point my heart rate has returned to normal. He’s healthy, his tummy just looks… odd. We were referred to a surgeon in Austin, and he is good. Yay! After that day I was a little stressed, I may or may not have bought cookies to make up for the horribly stressful day. We are so glad sweet Zach is healthy!