Good Times at the ER

(Note to wife: This post will be a poor attempt to chronicle the events of the last Tuesday night and Wednesday morning. Feel free to correct me on anything that I'm remembering incorrectly. There will likely be much misrememberment*.)

Toby likes to tell us things. Sometimes, they are things that actually happen. Sometimes, they are not things that actually happen. Sometimes, he likes to announce to us that he's doing something that he's not supposed to do. He's just a chatty boy. Around 8pm Tuesday**, Toby ran to his mommy and daddy with an empty bottle of cough suppressant. Personally, I think he brought it to us because he knew he shouldn't have picked it up in the first place. Regardless, Robyn asked him why the bottle was empty... and Toby said "dwink", which is toddler for "drink."

Oh boy.

Poison control was called within minutes. They said that he'd probably be ok as long as he didn't "dwink" more than 1/3 of the bottle. The general consensus is that there wasn't more than 1/2 left in the bottle to begin with... there was a little bit of the medicine in a little puddle at the bottom of the closet... there was no evidence that he drank anything, nothing on his lips or mouth or breath... it was entirely possible that there was less than 1/3 of the bottle to begin with and that he poured it down the drain...

To be safe, they recommended we take him to Children's Hospital Emergency Room anyway. So, off we went. At first, this was not a chore, as the boy was having a good time. Tobe asks us to take him to the doctor regularly, as he thinks the doctor's office is a fun place. (He gets to step on the scale, the really cool doc uses a stethoscope, etc.) The ER folks were monitoring his breathing and his heartrate for signs of trouble.

About 3 hours in, there was no evidence of a problem. At this point, it's 2 1/2 hours beyond his bedtime, so he's toast. (The docs keep peppering us with intense questions like "is he acting normal? Do you see anything in his behavior that is different from usual?" and we say "How are we supposed to know what 'normal' is when it's this far past his bedtime?") If he needed to be admitted, then it was damn time to give him a room, cause he needed rest. If he didn't need to be admitted, then it was damn time to go the heck home.

Off I went to present my thoughts to the suddenly-elusive ER staff. Eventually, we got the doc. I said "it's been 3 hours since he may or may not have ingested any medicine. His heart and lungs have been perfectly normal, and he's not acting unusually... do we really need to be here?" Doc confessed "if there was something wrong, we probably would have seen something by now... either heartrate or breathing or vomiting," of which there was none.

"Officially," he said, "considering the maximum medicine he could possibly have taken, we would recommend he be monitored for 12 hours, which would mean admitting him overnight, but if you don't want to do that, since he seems fine, you can take him home." After a short discussion, we decided to go home. The doc was to come back with the paperwork...

...but he came back sans documents. He added, "before I bring the paperwork, there's something you should know. Since the hospital's official recommendation was 12 hours, if you leave, we will have to say you left against the hospital's guidance, and your insurance will not cover any of this."

Thanks a whole lot, a-hole! Who can afford 3 hours in the ER without insurance? "Well, now we can't afford to leave. This is ridiculous. Admit him." Of course, it was 2 more hours until they finally got Tobe a room. It was 1:00am and Tobe was still awake. Nobody slept much. (I slept the most, but that isn't saying much.) Alarms were going off all night because his heart monitor was malfunctioning. Nurses insisted on using all that stupid technology on a kid that was so obviously NOT under the influence of any foreign substances. They finally let us leave after approximately 739 doctors cleared him to go around 9:30 or 10:00am.

I wonder what the bill is going to be. I know one thing, for sure, my high-deductible medical plan will reach the deductible before baby #2 is born. So, to recap...

We assumed that Toby probably didn't drink any of the medicine. If he did, all he got was a little taste, we think. Poison control said he would have had to drink an awful lot in order for him to be in any danger. But we tried to do "the right thing" or "the safe thing" and have him checked out. And then we were held hostage for 12 hours by the hospital's legal defense team.

Thank God Tobe is safe and healthy. And also, thank God that I was given the patience and self-control to not stab that ER doc in the neck.

*(I will now go on record and prognosticate that either GWB, Hillary, Obama, or McCain will use the non-word "misrememberment" on or before January 20, 2009.)

**(Note to self: This is yet another of the multitude of reasons to do taxes prior to April 15. If I was counting on finishing taxes that night, not only would we have filed late, but we also would have forfeited our government stimulus check. DO YOUR TAXES IN FEBRUARY NEXT YEAR, you idiot. This concludes your note to self.)