Not how I expected to spend the day

Last night Libby was messing around with one of our dining chairs and one thing led to another and I heard Jaina scream and ran in the room to find her on the floor with the chair on top of her. I think Libby may have been walking backwards, dragging the chair, and tripped over Jaina. Jaina had a bruise in a line from her forehead, over her eye, and onto her cheek bone. She calmed down right away and was acting normally all night, so I wasn't worried.

This morning she was cranky and threw up once. She's teething and got a vaccine yesterday, so I put it down to feeling crummy from both of those things. She slept fine last night and went down for her nap at 10 this morning as usual, and woke up at her normal time of noon. It was when she woke up from her nap that things started to get weird. She was extremely fussy, I was unable to put her down. If I did, she couldn't sit up, would just fall over. She would try to crawl, make it a few steps, then would just lie down on the floor and not move. I picked her up to nurse her, thinking it would help her calm down. Then she arched her back, her body got stiff, then trembled like you do when you get a chill. She yelled real loud, then her eyes started rolling side-to-side, like a ticking clock. This happened for about 30 seconds, then repeated 5 times over the next hour. My first thought was "seizure", my second "head injury". I called John, telling him to come home right away (he had the car), then our pediatrician. While waiting for John I tried to get Jaina to stand or walk, but she just kept crumbling to the floor and laying there.

John came home and we went straight to the pediatrician's office. After a thourough neurological exam, she proclaimed Jaina healthy but sent us to the ER for follow-up and possibly a CT scan, just in case. She said she honestly didn't think anything was wrong, that the weird eye thing and weakness were results of the vaccine and would resolve on their own. But, she also said you don't mess around with possible head injuries and recommended the ER. So we headed over to Children's (same hospital as in Dallas, it pays to live in a big city). We got to the ER and were in a room and being seen within about 10-15 minutes. Once again, she was given a thourough neurological exam, by both the resident and the attending physician's. By the time 4 o'clock came around, they determined that there was no risk of concussion or hemorrage. Her pupils dilated evenly, there was no swelling around her bruise, no bleeding in the ears. We were told the eye rolling episodes were most likely "mini-seizures" caused by fever (she's had one off-and for a few days from teething, and then the vaccine causes one as well) and that the muscle weakness was probably due to leg pain from the vaccine. She hadn't had any episodes for 3 hours, and if it had been a head injury they would have continued.

Jaina was extremely fussy, having not eaten for 4 hours and missing her second nap, so the doctor asked me to feed her and see if it calmed her down. They brought some motrin when she was about halfway through her bottle. She took it fine, then immediatly threw up everything she just drank. We got her (and me, and the floor) as clean as possible, then she finished her bottle. She did calm down and was acting more normal, but still couldn't sit up very well. The doctor signed us off and we came home.

Jaina is still clingy and cries if you set her down, and still can't support herself sitting up or standing. She's wobbly like a 4-month old baby. I did some reading online and saw that the DTaP vaccine can cause muscle weakness, and that it resolves within a few days. One more reason why I'm not wild about vaccines. She fell asleep soon after coming home and is in bed now. She was approaching the 24-hour post chair falling on the head episode when we left the ER, so we're in the clear now. I do need to keep an eye on her still, for excessive vomiting, more seizures, etc. But the doctor thinks she'll be back to normal tomorrow.

This morning I was wishing John would be home more. This wasn't quite what I had in mind.