The best for our kids

As a parent, we always want what is best for our children. Whether it is going to a good school, living in a nice neighborhood, or just making sure that they have the essentials every day: food, clothes shelter. Somehow, some way, no matter how much we love them and try to do our best for them, something comes along and changes that notion for you as a parent.

A few weeks ago my son had a health scare that lead us to spend most of the day in the emergency room. After all the tests were done and the results came in, there was nothing of significance found, but there were a few words in the ER notes that stood out: "possible seizure".

Those words alone threw me off and when thinking about it I wondered "How can my 4-year-old have a seizure?" Every parent wants their child to be perfect or at least have a better childhood than the one they had. We want them to not have to worry about anything. I remembered I cried when my daughter got glasses because I remembered what it was like when I wore glasses. Since my wife and I wore glasses, I kind of knew the probability of her wearing glasses would be high, but that didn't stop me from wishing she had perfect sight.

We were fortunate enough to get our son in for a EEG (Electroencephalography) done on him that Friday from his incident. To get him prepared for this test we were given specific orders on how to prepare him and it was not pretty. The night before we had to keep him awake until midnight. I took the first shift, if you will, and stayed up with him. We had movies all set to watch and we watched "The Secret Life of Pets". While I myself was fighting to stay awake, he was focused and watching the movie.

Next, we had to wake him up at 4am and keep him awake until his appointment which was not until 10:40. You know how when you take a long car ride and your child falls asleep and you try to wake them up? The whining and sometimes crying because they don't want to wake up? Yep, that's what we were dealing with. My wife took this shift and woke us up at that time and together we tried to keep him awake. For this round they watched "Sing" while I drifted in and out of sleep while my wife kept our son awake.

By the time my daughter was awake and ready to go to school my son was still awake and a little hyper. Which was a good thing, but we both knew that sooner or later he was going to crash and we had to make sure that didn't happen.

I took my daughter to school and came back home to pick up my wife and son. As we were getting my son ready to go we could see the heaviness in his eyes. My wife sat in the back seat with him and kept talking to him to keep him awake. I had the music on a little louder than usual, hoping that the music would keep him awake. By the time we got to the hospital, he was awake, but he was also sleepy and cranky. Fortunately, we did not have to wait long to be called in, but only one of us was able to go into the room with him. My wife said she would go and I went back to the waiting room and tried to relax for the next hour.

While sitting in the waiting room I tried to relax and just focus on the good: my son was alive, healthy and all the tests came up clear. As things do when you are alone, my mind started thinking about all that could go wrong. "What if this is the beginning of something major?" "What if today's test finds something that the doctors missed?" "Why can't I relax in these chairs?"

Something that helped pass the time was my wife sending me text updates and pictures of our son laying in the bed and sleeping with this helmet like device on his head. She told me that as soon as the technician told him to lay down and go to sleep, he was out within a few minutes.

When my wife walked back to the waiting room with our son, he had his hair all slicked back and was telling us he was tired and hungry. We were told that the results would be in 3-4 days and our doctor will let us know if anything was found.

I'm going to say that I am a very patient man, but I wished there was a way to speed up time and get the results sooner than the 3-4 days timeframe we were given.

We were lucky that we didn't have to wait that long for our results. The health practice where my wife works is also the one where we take our children and my son's doctor was working with my wife the following day. She told my wife that she got the results and they noticed some seizure activity during one of the parts of the test. She prescribed some medication in case it happens again and will look into moving up our appointment with the neurology department.

So there it is. Seizure activity. What will this mean for my son and his future? Maybe I'm being a little too dramatic, but everything has been so smooth with my daughter that my son is constantly throwing curveballs at my wife and I. Our son already has some speech development issues and now throwing in seizures is just devastating for me.

I think this episode in our lives is going to make not only our family strong but it will also make our son stronger. I think if this is something that will be a constant in his life that he will overcome it and show us the meaning of persistence. I don't know. Maybe I am getting ahead of myself. Maybe I'm letting the dark side of my mind put thoughts in my head that should not be there.

I am praying that it will be nothing and it will be something that will fade away in time. As we wait for our appointment we are writing down questions and just taking everything day by day. This little journey is not done yet, but my family will be there together to make sure we see it through to the end.

Thanks for reading.