No news is good news..

I know it has been a while since my last post, but as the old saying goes "No news is good news". Since surgery things have been relatively uneventful, until this week. On Monday night I noticed that Parker's temperature was a little elevated. It was higher than normal, but nothing to be concerned about. Then on Tuesday morning, it spiked to 101 degrees. We spent all of Tuesday afternoon at the pediatrician and most of the evening-until 8 ish- at the hospital getting blood work, specimens, cultures, etc. You name it, the test was done. Things are so much different with him than a normal baby. We had to rule out everything from a viral infection to severe peritonitis. His lab results seemed fine, and his white blood cell count was normal. In fact it was only 7 and we aren't told to report to the ER until it reaches 100.They gave him a strong antibiotic shot just to be cautious and we came home. Well, when we got home, I connected him to his machine immediately, but things weren't as good as we thought they were. His dialysis fluid became cloudy around 10 o'clock that night, which is a sure sign of peritonitis. I was so upset, I cried myself to sleep. As a parent, who administers his dialysis, you almost feel like you are at fault. Like you caused this to happen. Like you weren't careful enough or sterile enough. You feel like you did this to your child. It's pretty much the worst feeling ever. Anyways, the next morning they re-did every test possible. I was a nervous wreck all day because his lab results, which were taken at noon, didn't come back until 10 PM! Low and behold, his white blood cell count came back at 89. We left bright and early this morning to go to Children's and we spent the entire day there. Once again, a full spectrum of testing was done. Parker was diagnosed with a mild case of peritonitis. We caught it early enough that we can give him antibiotics at home in his dialysis for the next 2 weeks. If it had been severe, we would have been admitted to the either the floor or the PICU for IV antibiotics. We are extremely lucky this time. I say that, all the while hoping and praying that there is never a "next time". Parker is already feeling better and is acting like his normal self again.