That's the highest it has been and here we are one week after the onset of his first headache. Naturally he was poked and prodded and a lot of blood was taken for the labs. By this time we were at 9pm.
Two hours later the doctor came back in with his entourage to give us the results of the labs. Axel's white cell count was extremely high. There was a great probability that he had some type of Leukemia, an ambulance was ordered and he was being transferred to CCMC Emergency Department. Our hearts sank that very minute and we knew that from this point on, our lives, Axel's life, would be changed. Maybe not forever, but drastically changed."
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Axel has been a part of our family since he was five months old. Maybe it was six. Yes, definitely six. It's been a long time, let's put it that way. No we didn't adopt him, he's our grandson, a product of my oldest son. Having him with us for the past 9 years has been a blessing at best. We both had kids that were grown and out of the house and were in no way ready to take on another child. Needless to say, we did what we had to do. The circumstances were less than pleasing that led up to Axel being with us, but that's a story for another day.
Axel was always an extremely healthy child. Rarely did he have a cold, fever, stomach ache, headache, etc. Hell, I think he threw up twice in the 9 years he's been with us. It was always easy for us to tell when something was wrong because of the fact that he was always so healthy.
Summer 2017. Axel just finished 2nd grade and was looking forward to starting 3rd grade with his first male teacher. This summer wasn't any different than any other. We were planning all the usual summertime activities. We set up our pool, went to Vermont, Bill and Axel went fishing, we spent time with friends or just hung out at home.
Sunday, July 16 we had been invited to spend the day with one of Bill's friends at a lake house they rented for the week. We had a really nice time visiting, going on the boat, tubing and if I'm not mistaken, Axel even went for a ride on the jet ski. We ended up spending almost the whole day there but had to cut it short to get home for Sadie, our dog. She was getting up there in years and not knowing what we were going to find, we figured it would be best to head home around 6.
Arriving home, we knew right away something was wrong when we saw her. She couldn't stand up and was just laying on the dining room floor. Bill had to pick her up and carry her outside to relieve herself which she did promptly. Not long after that, she just laid down on the grass and we knew at that moment that she wasn't going to get back up. Surrounded by her family and with her head on my lap, our beloved Sadie quietly took her last few breaths. This would be Axels first experience with the loss of a pet. He did remarkably well for an 8-year old. he cried, he hugged her, pet her and then got up and went about his business. Sometime later that week, when Bill was sad about the loss of his best friend, Axel asked him why.
"Pepe, Why are you so sad about Sadie?" he asked him. Bill would reply with the obvious answer "Because I miss Sadie so much. Don't you?" he asked.
"Yes I do Pepe but I'm over it." Pointing to his heart he continued, "Because she will always be right here." Such an amazing kid.
The next couple weeks were pretty normal. Axel went to "kids camp" at the local child care center in the morning, Bill and I went to work than we are home, swim in the pool, miss the dog, look for a puppy, etc.
Friday July 28 Axel woke up and didn't seem right. He was a little flushed in the face and just blah. No fever, no cough, no sniffles, just a headache. He went to his camp and about 1:00 I got a call at work that he had a fever and wasn't feeling well. His fever was 102.
I tried to get in touch with his pediatrician in town and explained that he had a headache and a high fever. I was asked if I could come in on Monday because they were really busy and didn't have an opening. Really? Three days after I call with a 102 fever?? At that point I figured he was fighting a bug so I took him home, gave him some Tylenol and he slept. When he woke up he felt better but then Saturday and Sunday were pretty much the same so I made the decision to take him to the walk in center on Monday if the fever still persisted. Come Monday morning his fever was back up to 102 so I just took him in. After examination, Axel had all the symptoms of a sinus infection so that's what they treated him for, with the typical go-to, Amoxicillin for the "infection" and Tylenol for the fever. If it wasn't better by Wednesday I needed to bring him back.
Everyone who has had a child in daycare knows that they are no allowed to go back until they are fever free for 24 hours. We never got to that point so Axel had to come to work with me. He seemed to be doing OK, just had the persistent fever. By Wednesday we were still doing the fever thing so I took him back in and this time he was given a stronger antibiotic. I was starting to get a bit concerned at this point because for one, this wasn't going away and for 2, it seemed to be getting worse. "If this isn't better by Friday, come back. We will need to do more tests." All I could say was "OK."
On Friday am, Axel was just "not right". He was complaining about his headache and the fever was more persistent. Around noon, he started complaining that his chest hurt as well as his side. I called Bill after that as I was starting to get worried. More worried than I had been already.
"Something is seriously wrong with this child. They are missing something and I'm not fooling around anymore." I told him. "Meet me at the UCONN ED after work."
I work in West Hartford so I am only 7 minutes away from UCONN. I called Bill as soon as I left work and he said he was already on his way. Being as close as I was, Axel and I got there first so we waited for Bill to get there so we could go in together. I think we finally got there around 5:20 or so. We didn't have to wait very long before Axel was called in. They took one look at him and immediately took his temperature and ordered a blood culture. His temperature was now 104.
The waiting was torturous. The blood had to be sent out to their lab and the not knowing was absolutely killing us. The nurses continued to give Axel Tylenol for his fever, put ice packs on him and pretty much that's all they could do. We sat there wondering, worrying, and just comforting an 8-year old that didn't feel good and was obviously uncomfortable in his chest and side. His fever did finally break so he was a little more relaxed but it kept coming back and he was right back to being uncomfortable again. It was an extremely vicious cycle and a painful one to watch.
Around 11pm a bunch of people came in. In all my experience with hospitals and ER's, it's NEVER good when a lot of people come into the room. One was the resident doctor and the others were interns I believe.
"We got the results back from the blood tests. I'ts not good." Those were the first words we heard. "His white cell count is astronomically high. We ordered an ambulance to take you to CCMC. There is a very high chance that your child has Leukemia."
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