The Calm Before the Storm

My sister had gotten married earlier this year, but she wasn’t going to have her reception until June 3rd, giving us and the family enough time to get together to celebrate and have a good time. Of course this was one of the most anticipated dates of the year, and we had everything ready, our dresses, my husband’s and Erick's clothes were ready for the big event. I even did my sister’s wedding makeup and other family members, and the great thing about the location was that there was absolutely no cellphone reception; meaning it was truly a time to get together as a family and cherish everything. During the wedding reception, Erick was not his normal self, he was very much on his own little world; all the children in the family invited him to play, but he just kept to himself. He didn’t have a fever, or any other symptoms, he just looked sad. Eventually night time came and most of the family left and he started acting like himself playing around and having a good time. By the end of the night, my mom offered to take Erick home so we could continue celebrating, but Erick was attached to me like glue. He didn’t want to go home with my mom (which he usually does), he fought against her and eventually she gave up and we went home and called it a night. The sunday after was just a chill family day and we were all just watching movies and eating pure junk food, it wasn't until Monday evening when Erick began to change.

Monday, oh hectic monday. As always it was a challenge to get Erick ready, getting myself ready, drop him off with the babysitter, drag myself into work, go through the work day and so on and so on. I had to drop my brother-in-law at an exit close to his home, and I finally called my son’s babysitter to notify her that I was running late when I got the “heads up” that Erick wasn't feeling too well. She had given me a brief recap of how his day had gone; he started complaining about his head hurting, his skin had a yellow tint, he had a bit of a fever, and hadn't been himself. When I got to her house, my anxiety was slowly rising up, he wasn't my playful baby that he always had been. During the car ride home I called his doctor and basically demanded a blood test the next day, it was too much sickness for two months. His doctor agreed and told me to give him some fever medicine and have him take a bath to break the fever. The next day Luis (my husband) agreed to come with us to the appointment, and as we were walking into the clinic he noticed that Erick had a lump under his chin. We both freaked and immediately told the nurse and the doctor, and they gave us some antibiotics and ordered a blood test to be done.

After the blood work was done, the nurses had told us that the doctor was going to call us later in the afternoon, and the rest of the day was just relaxed. We ate mangos, and continued to watch movies and didn't think much of the blood tests. I did however call around 4 pm to ask about the updates on Erick’s blood test and the nurse assured me that she was going to call back. Well, eventually it was after five and I just thought to myself that the blood work came out ok. The doctor that had seen us that day eventually called and told us to pack some stuff for Erick and headed out to the hospital, and told us that he needed a blood transfusion ASAP! She even suggested to call an ambulance if we couldn't drive ourselves to the hospital. Anxiety hit both Luis and I hard, but we didn’t know enough to jump into conclusions, at that point all we could do is wait.