I'm calling it a miracle story because that's simply what it is.
Our family is rejoicing with all of our hearts this morning because we still have our little girl with us. The "incident" happened Monday afternoon and could have turned into a terrible tragedy, but God in His mercy spared us, and we are so grateful for His safekeeping.
I put Ni'ke and Ya'shar down for naps Monday afternoon (the other two were out at the movies with Daddy) and decided to sit in bed and watch tv while they napped. Ya'shar had been sick with a fever and I was giving him breathing treatments all day, so I wanted to keep a close eye on him.
About 4:00 I heard Ni'ke suddenly start crying and screaming. I rushed into her room and she was sitting up in her bed, gagging, coughing and grabbing her throat. I could tell she was choking on something, but had no idea what. She was still breathing and trying to talk, but "it" was making it's way down her throat and catching, causing her terrible pain. She was salivating so much and starting to panic, and I wasn't far behind.
I grabbed her up and ran to the bedroom and called 911, thinking "Lord, this can't be happening again..." I kept asking her "What did you eat? What did you put in your mouth?" Finally she told me "Rea's ring."
My heart sank, because the only ring Rea has is a HUGE rectangle pink gaudy plastic thing - I couldn't imagine that she could have tried to swallow it! After a few attempts to get it "up", I finally told her to just SWALLOW IT!!
By the time the paramedics and firemen arrived, Ni'ke was calm and looking "completely normal", and the ring seemed to have gone all the way down. We still needed to take her in for xrays to make sure.
In the mean time, the police were able to find Daryle, who had turned his cell phone off during the movie and he was on his way back home. (Yes, we have since learned how to access the vibrate setting!!) :)
While we were waiting for D and the kids to get back, the paramedics and I were chit-chatting about crazy things that kids do and swapping stories. I looked down at Ni'ke's head and tossled her hair and gave her a kiss, and all of a sudden, it occurred to me that the barrette I had put in her hair that morning was missing. "Ni'ke, where's your pretty that Mommy put in your hair?"
She looked up at me with these huge, wide innocent eyes, and said, "I ate it."
OK, this was sooo much worse. So now instead of a round smooth, blunt thing trying to make it's way through her digestive system, we had a two inch long, half inch wide, sharp pointy thing. Not good. I ran upstairs to check in her room and in her bed covers, and nope, it wasn't there ANYWHERE!
I found another one just like it in the bathroom and put in my pocket to show the doctor when we got to ER.
Once we got to ER, the next several minutes were riddled with comments like, "She ate WHAT?" and "Are you SURE she swallowed it?"
The xray confirmed the worst. The barrette hadn't made it all the way down, it was stuck in her esophagus vertically, just below the area of her collar bone. I couldn't believe what I was seeing on the xray!! It was so HUGE!! (Stay tuned for pictres soon...) And to look at her, you would never know. She was laughing and playing and coloring and talking to her new teddy bear, compliments of the firefighters, and didn't seem to get what was happening at all!
So now the real challenge began...
Because of where it was stuck, the doctors would have to "go in after it", and it wouldn't be easy. I was so grateful we were at my hospital where I work - I knew the doctors and nurses which reassured me, but I also knew there might be some problems because she was a pediatric patient, not a specialty of ours.
Sure enough, after dozens of phone calls to several GI and ENT (ear nose throat) doctors, Dr. Pearl (our ER doc) found a doctor who was willing to do the procedure on a child, but the hospital didn't have the right instrumentation. They needed a small, rigid pediatric scope to put down her esophagus, and apparently there's only one in Sonoma county, and none of the doctors knew which hospital it was at.
Are you kidding me?!?!?!We called another ENT doctor we know who has treated other members of our family (including Ma-lak who stuck a toy dinosaur tail in his ear earlier this year). He was off duty, but was willing to do the surgery if they had the right scope, which we knew they didn't, so he recommended we just go to Oakland Children's Hospital, the same thing the ER doc was concluding we would have to do.
Of course this wasn't ideal because it's over an hour away, but it truly was the best place for her to be, since they're in the know on all things kid-related. Once again, because she wasn't "emergent", no ambulance ride down was offered, and we were discharged home with the instructions to "drive to Oakland immediately." By this time it was 8:00 pm, I hadn't slept in 24 hours b/c I'd worked the night before, and I still had another very sick child at home, Ya'shar.
Lore, help us!
We stopped at the house for a quick change of clothes, to check on Ya'shar, and for family prayer time. While this was a terrible situation, we counted our blessings, knowing it could all be so much worse...
We agreed Daryle would stay home with the other children and take care of Ya'shar in case he got worse, and I would take Ni'ke down. We were trying to think of who could road trip down with me, to keep an eye on Ni'ke while I drove, and to help keep me awake! Most of my friends were working, and our church family/friends were already in the city or down in San Fran. But praise God, Charienette was available!
She's another friend from work, and she dropped everything to help us out! I picked her up 10 minutes later, and we were on our way!
We got to Oakland Children's about 10:00 pm, and had a bit of a wait, which I wasn't expecting because they were supposedly expecting US! Mama was running out of patience at this point, and not feeling so much love for the healthcare system!
Finally, at 11:00, we got into an ER room and she got another xray to confirm it was still in the same place, essentially it had only moved down about 1/4 inch.
Surgery, still on.
Because the surgeons were doing another procedure on someone else, we had to wait our turn... Ni'ke finally fell asleep for about an hour before they came to get her for surgery, which was a little before 1:00 am. Dr. Kim and his resident explained that they would be doing an "esophagoscopy" and that it hopefully wouldn't take too long.
We prayed over Ni'ke and for the surgeons and for a quick, painless and uneventful surgery, and off she went. It actually only took them EIGHT minutes to get the barrette out! She was in recovery for nearly an hour, and because there was some bleeding when they removed it, they wanted to keep her overnight for observation.
She slept all night, had no pain, and in the morning was wide-eyed and ready to EAT!! God, You are so good! The rest is pretty uneventful history, and we were home by 12:30 that next afternoon. Hallelujah!!
It was truly a blessing to have Charinette there with me, who never complained about waiting or being tired, who only prayed with me and supported us and helped me in everyway she could. Thank you, friend, for unselfishly offerering yourself to us when we needed help the most! May God richly bless you in return.
On a bit of a side note, when the doctors were working her up for surgery, they discovered that Ni'ke has a heart murmur. They believe it is an "innocent" murmur that she will likely grow out of, but have recommended we follow up with our family doctor and cardiologist.
Please continue to pray for the health and safety of our family. It is indeed a dark and dry place where we serve here in Northern California - the strongholds are great, and the spirital warfare over this region has intensified magnificently in the past few weeks especially, what with the election results and anger over the gay marriage issues.
The church must come together in prayer with a vengeance. Pray for your children, for strengthening for the family unit, pray for your political leaders, and pray for your pastors and church leaders. Pray with fervor like you've never prayed before, and then be not only hopeful, be EXPECTANT that God will do great and mighty things, for this battle is already won and we have emerged victorious!
Incidentally, Ni'ke Lacham Aphelah Smith's name means "victorious in the battle against darkness." Just thought you might be blessed to know that!
We love you, Lord, and will always be faithful! Thank you for preserving us!
