The bravest boy in the whole wide world

Here are some photos of the beginning of Austin's new diabetic life, in no particular order. We are so proud of our incredible little boy and feel very blessed to have him in our lives.

It's hard to tell from this picture, but basically the first 24 hours he was in the hospital, Austin had a finger poked at least once per hour. His tiny fingers looked horrible by Wednesday morning. Poor little guy.

It was so hard for us to see him like this. He looked so tiny on the hospital bed. We are so thankful to have him home and living life as normal as possible.

Here's Austin's bed at home, with Hospital Buddy and Rufus in their new home. We happily adopted them and brought them home from the hospital. Rufus is a bear with diabetes just like Austin, he was given to him by the JDRF. Rufus wears a diabetic bracelet just like Austin. And sometimes Rufus and Austin talk about what it's like to have diabetes.

How would Austin get through all this without the love of sweet sisters? Here's a card Megan mailed him to help him feel better (on the back she drew a picture of a needle).

This is our lives now, counting every single carb that goes into that kids mouth. Here's our new snack box with everything carefully portioned and labeled. We keep getting told that one day we'll be experts at this.

When Austin could finally leave on Friday afternoon he got to go for a wheelchair ride, which he thought was pretty cool!

Here is Austin with HIS Nichole, she was his favorite nurse and she took awesome care of him. She has a very special place in all of our hearts.

Here is Hospital Buddy, he was given to Austin to take care of. Austin checked his blood pressure, looked in his ears, listened to his heart, gave him shots and loved him better.

As you might imagine, it was quite the job to convince a 3 year old to let us poke his finger and give him injections over and over again so we made him these sticker charts, once he fills a sticker chart he gets to go to a dollar store and pick any toy he wants.

Here's Austin snuggled up with his daddy and Buddy watching a movie (we watched a lot of movies!) his cousin Josh brought up Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs the first day and we probably watched that eight times while in the hospital.

We all thought it was pretty cool that Spiderman was hanging out at his hospital. Each morning we had to go check and see if Spiderman was still there.

Here's Austin playing in the Play Room with Janiel. Every time Rob and I had one of our longer classes a volunteer would play with Austin in the Play Room until we were done. The volunteers were all so awesome and he loved all the different things they had for him to do there.

Here's Austin when they FINALLY let him have a meal. He ate ham and pancakes and he ate every tiny bite and then licked all the syrup off the plate.

Austin loved it when volunteers would stop by and see if he needed any toys. They had every thing he asked for and it was great, especially when he was still "plugged in" and couldn't get around much. He was so happy when they took him off the IV and he was "unplugged"

Here's Austin and Kaylee at 6am the morning before he went into the hospital, he was feeling so yucky that he couldn't sleep anymore (a giveaway that something is wrong, the kid would sleep until 9am if we let him)

Cheetos

It is amazing how fast your life can change. Our lives have changed in a big way, and it's therapeutic for me to write about it, but I seriously don't expect anyone to read the entire novel that will follow:

Our 3 year old Austin has been diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes. On a scale of 1-10 on how knowledgable Rob and I were on diabetes before all this I would have to say we were a 0.5. In fact, if it weren't for my mother-in-law suggesting the possibility of diabetes I don't know when we would have put it all together that all the stuff going on with him was all tied together.
For some of you who may be like we were and not know the symptoms here are the things we noticed with him. Austin has been wetting the bed all the time, and not a little bit, he was completely filling a pull-up and then some and going potty all day long. He was ALWAYS thirsty, and always hungry. I thought the frequent trips to the bathroom were due to all the water he had been drinking. His behavior had also been getting worse, he'd scream over the tiniest things and he had become so clingy to me, he wanted me right next to him or holding him every second of the day. We thought he was possibly acting out because he's the middle child and wanted more attention or something, plus he is three after all. He was also getting skinnier, I thought this was due to the fact that he is going to turn four soon and was just getting the thinner "little boy" look instead of the toddler look.


When I started to research juvenile diabetes, Austin had almost every symptom. I hadn't weighed him for a while, and it honestly hadn't occurred to me that his "thinning out" could have been him actually losing weight. I told him and Megan that I wanted to check their numbers and so I weighed them both. Megan was the same as she was about 5-6 weeks ago, but Austin was 32 lbs, and he was about 37 lbs before. I stared at the wall and cried for a while and then Rob came home from the gym and asked what was wrong, when I told him, and we started going through the symptoms he just kinda sunk onto the couch and it feels like our lives have been in slow motion ever since.


If you've ever lived in our ward, you'll know that the next thing we did was call an amazing lady named Shannon. I told her what we were concerned about and why, she said we needed to take it very seriously and even offered to come over that night and test his blood sugar. When she tested it, his level was too high for her meter to read. She told us to get into his pediatrician in the morning and that we would probably be sent to the hospital. So Rob made arrangements to stay home from work the next day and we went in to see his Doctor. They weighed him (now down to 31 lbs), took a urine sample, x-ray of his tummy, and did another glucose test, which was 544. The Dr. came back in with another Dr. and sat down and explained how serious this was and told his that we needed to get to the emergency room at Primary Children's and that they would probably keep us for a few days.


After we left Rob and I were sobbing and trying so hard not to upset Austin, we went home and packed a bag. In hindsight we probably should have let someone else pack the bag for it, we were both in a fog and just threw random things in a bag so we got a couple of the things we needed down here. Austin didn't understand at all why he had to go to the hospital and kept asking if he could just stay home. Rob's parents offered to help so we sent them to my office to drop off my work phone and they came down to the ER with us to watch Kaylee so we could focus on Austin. On the drive down, Megan called from school and said she was sick and needed to be picked up. I started crying and told her where we were and why I couldn't come and get her, then I got on the phone with one of the secretaries and made arrangements for our awesome neighbor to come and get her until someone in the family could pick her up.


When we got to the ER Austin kept telling me how hungry he was, after a while of waiting I thought that since we hadn't been told not to feed him that I would just go ahead and get him something so we went over to the vending machine and he picked out cheetos, just as I was getting coins out of my purse they called us back and Austin was devastated that he didn't get his cheetos. They examined him, his glucose level was now 579, and said they would be admitting him and we needed to wait for a free ER room to start treating him. They also told us that we could not give him any food or drink until they told us it was okay. Austin was devastated and he didn't understand, so he kept saying "Cheetos" "Cheetos" it was horrible to know how hungry and thirsty he was and so hard to try to explain why he couldn't have anything.


They brought him into an ER room and said that they were going to get him on an IV drip to get some fluids in him. Wow- getting an IV into a three year old, that's all I will say- Wow. After a bag of fluids they started him on an insulin drip as well. He screamed and cried the entire time we were down there which was about 3 hours. When they finally had a room ready for him we took him upstairs, I carried him in my arms like a baby and Rob and the nurse followed with his IV. He seemed to calm down a little bit when we got him settled into his room, he liked the Lady and the Tramp picture hanging on his wall and even gave us a little half smile. Every time someone came in to check on him or do a blood test he would cry and ask them for Cheetos. It was breaking everyone's hearts and we all kept promising him that as soon as we could get him a little better that he could have some cheetos. Rob and I took turns laying by him and comforting him, and reassuring him that we would get him cheetos as soon as we could. Rob and I hadn't eaten anything all day either so around 6pm we were sent down to get some food, which was hard since neither one of us wanted to eat until Austin could. While in the cafeteria I saw a little bag of cheetos to get for Austin so that as soon as they said he could have something they would be ready for him. When we came back up, his nurse was so excited to tell us that the Dr. had given them permission to give him a small bag of cheetos and 4 oz of water. It made us both cry. We went into the room and found a happy little guy licking little orange fingers and watching a movie. What a tender mercy that small bag of cheetos was for our little boy. That night was the hardest night of our lives. They had been poking his finger every hour to test his levels and they told us that they were going to have to continue to do that all through the night. Rob was nearing his breaking point, and Austin was still very clingy with me so we decided that Rob would head home with Kaylee and I would stay the night with Austin. I was in his bed with him the entire night, they'd come in and poke him for a blood test and he would cry and cry and then they'd check his vitals and were changing his IV fluids frequently (they were trying to find the right combination of glucose water and insulin to bring down his blood sugar slowly and safely) every time they would change it, he would cry about his hand hurting where the IV went in and they'd give us a new heat pack for me to hold on his hand. We'd go through all of this and I'd get him settled and finally to sleep only to be woken again in about 10-15 minutes to do it all again. I would rather relive labor and delivery for all three of our kids again before repeating that night.



Things improved Wednesday morning when Austin was stable enough to come off the IV and could finally eat a real meal, but then we had to start injections...they brought him pancakes and ham and he ate every bit and then licked the syrup off the plate. Austin was miserable so I took him out to find the hospitals play room to cheer him up. It wasn't open for the day yet, so we just peeked in the window but he was so excited when he saw all the toys and realized that he was able to play in there while we were here. He couldn't wait for daddy to come back to the hospital that morning so that they could go play in the playroom together. They have an amazing program here called Child Life Services, they have lots of volunteers and they make sure that all the kids are still able to be kids while they are here. They frequently bring around toys and activities for the kids to do in their rooms, and books to read, they come in to play with them, and the ones who are able to go to their playroom get to to do all kinds of things there. They do some crafts with them in there, but then they also bring the crafts around to the rooms of those who can't go into the playroom. The thing that touched us the most is when they came in and gave Austin his hospital buddy. They told him that his hospital buddy was sick just like him and asked him to take care of hospital buddy. He took his blood pressure, listened to his heart, gave him finger pokes and shots and bandaged them all up. What an amazing gift this was for him and we could see how much this soothed him. That little hospital buddy has helped him in a huge way and Rob and I have such appreciation for the amazing people that volunteer their time to help out kids like Austin.

The last three days have been filled with education for Rob and I. For some of our longer classes, a volunteer would take Austin to the playroom to play, which was so helpful. Of course we had Kaylee with us through it all which made things interesting. I thought that the more I learned the better I would feel, and it started that way, but then it started to go the other way... we were learning about what to do if he passes out and what can happen if we don't do the shots just right and all sorts of stuff, all good info that we needed, but by mid-day yesterday I was feeling so scared it was making me sick to my stomach and the thought of taking care of him at home without a hospital staff nearby is terrifying. We have been reassured by at least 20 people that we can do it, and I'm sure one day I will have more confidence in myself as well, but for now it is so scary to think of bringing him home today. Don't get me wrong, I am thrilled at the thought of sleeping in my own bed, I just want my little guy to get the best care possible, and when I'm the one with him most of the day- that frightens me. I feel completely inadequate to take care of him. Rob seems to be handling this part of it much better than I am. When we started the training on injections and finger pokes he jumped right in and was a pro within minutes, I was the pale-faced one standing back shaking. After all, shots and blood are the biggest reasons I don't work in the medical field!
This is plenty long already and truthfully I could go on and on but I think I'll end just writing about the nurses. Austin has had some terrific nurses while he has been here. Jed and Lindsay were both fantastic and Austin loved them, they both came to visit him a time or two when they weren't assigned to him anymore. But Nichole was his nurse the longest and she was his favorite. In fact in the few days we've been here she has become "his Nichole". We are so grateful that she came into our lives in this short, crucial time. Somehow this incredible person has helped Austin feel, for the most part, okay about getting shots and pokes. And she has helped Rob and I feel, for the most part, okay about taking care of him. She is awesome! She told us that she and her husband have been trying to have a baby for a few months and I hope that it works out for them because she is going to make a wonderful mommy some day! Thank you Nichole for taking such good care of our Austin!! We love you and will never forget you!

And now it's time to get ready to head home (ahh!) and the real work begins. We took a couple of pictures while we were here, we'll get those posted soon I hope.