Last night, after bathing, brushing, and book-reading, I laid Alia to sleep. Jessica was out at her book club meeting (1/2 hour away) and I was home watching Lost with 2 sleeping kids. Sometime about 8:15, I heard very faint crying and kept checking Grant's monitor, but he was silent. After a few minutes I decided to (pause Lost and) go upstairs and check on him. That's when I found out it was Alia that was crying.
She was inconsolable and non-communicative. I kept asking her if she was OK and if she wanted me to rock her some more, but she kept telling me to "Go away Daddy", so I left. After a conference with Jessica, we decided that she'd eventually go to sleep. and she did, 45 minutes later (9PM). At 9:45, there was more crying, so (after Lost was over) I went back up to lay down with her. At this point I had ruled out peeing or puking in bed, maybe nightmares, maybe she's in pain. After a while she started grabbing her leg and I was prodding around to find the source and didn't have much luck since she was crying so hard. Jessica came home and she slept with Alia for the night.
At 5:30 AM, we determined that her right leg was really causing the pain and we decided to let her try to walk. She refused to put any weight on her right leg, so I took her to the ER at Round Rock Medical Center. Dr Aslam and nurse Kelly were really nice and helpful. They ran some vitals and blood tests and took some X-rays. We watched some Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and got a giant purple remote for the TV. We also got a leopard doll, identical to the one we got last time in the ER. The Xrays came back negative, and all that was determined was that there was inflammation in her hip and she would have to be transferred downtown to Dell Children's hospital. I left the leopard behind, because we already had one, but later on Jessica noted that I should have kept it as a scoreboard for Alia's ER visits.
Since she had an IV port in her hand, they wouldn't let me drive her to Dell, so we had to take an ambulance. This was a lot of fun for Alia. She still wouldn't move her leg or let me pick her up, adjust her clothes for various test, etc. On the ambulance she obtained a cool Coca-Cola polar bear doll. At 10:30, we arrived at Dell.
The goal there was to run more tests that can only be performed there, plus access to pediatricians and pediatric orthopedists. Dr Myers and Nurse Lorena made our stay very comfortable. The next set of tests also came back negative,and with all the test results and films, the orthopedist said we were safe to go home. The official diagnosis was "idiopathic transient synovitis". Idiopathic means the cause is unknown. Transient means the condition will pass. Syno- means joint and -itis means inflammation. We are just going to keep her in bed for a few days on ibuprofen, and watch out for fever, which could indicate an infection (BAD).
We got home at 2 PM, and Alia has been sleeping ever since. She got virtually no sleep last night and a short nap during the day, so she needs it.
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