This week Kaiser had a seizure.  It was terrifying.  We'd been to the doc that morning and found out he had double ear infections and while we waited for his prescription to be filled we hit the zoo with some friends.  I took Kai out of his stroller to get ready to leave and suddenly his eyes rolled back in his head and his whole body started convulsing, including strong twitches in his facial muscles.  He was taking shallow gasping breaths and drooling like crazy.  I called 911 and Kai was still seizing when the ambulance arrived, and his lips and under eyes were turning blue.  His seizure was over 5 minutes long and he didn't stop convulsing until the paramedics put an oxygen mask on him.  When I tried to hold his little hand, his whole arm was contorted and stiff and he was still making awful gurgling choppy breathing sounds.  They took us to Primary Children's Hospital where we stayed for the next 4 hours to bring down his 104 temperature and make sure he woke up OK.  He was so sleepy that even when they pried open his eyelids to shine light in them and tickled his feet, he didn't even flinch.

For 3 hours he slept in my arms and then suddenly he opened his eyes, sat right up, started babbling and was reaching for his crackers.  In an instant we had our Kai back.  We were educated about Febrile seizures (seizures caused by fevers) and then sent home, relieved & exhausted.

Talk about a tender mercy, the girlfriend I was with at the zoo had just experienced a febrile seizure with her 19 month old 2 weeks earlier.  Before that she had never heard of them and until she told me about it, I had never heard of them.  Having her there was calming for me. 

How crazy that we live 3 doors away and both had the same thing happen within 2 weeks when none of us, including almost all of my other girlfriends even knew about these seizures!  The ER staff was wonderful and very helpful and informative.  They said that for parents these seizures are absolutely
horrifying but in the ER they are really common and they know that no lasting harm is usually done.  Even though I feel so much better being educated, I am a little freakish about checking for fevers giving tylenol & motrin to keep them down. 

Another tender mercy...Kai didn't sleep AT ALL that night and woke up with a nasty rash all over.  Back to the doc and he's got hand-foot-mouth disease.  Feeling completely sleep deprived and emotionally drained I did my best to take care of the kiddos and clean up breakfast but I just wished someone could scrub my kitchen floor.  It was dirty and I felt too tired to tackle it.  Not much later I got a text from my girlfriend offering to come and clean my house since I must be so exhausted.  She didn't even know about the 2nd doc visit or the sleepless night!  Talk about inspired!  Another girlfriend took Eliza for the day and 2 more brought us dinner that night.  I just pray that I will be that in tune in serving others the way we have been served.