Reagan's story

On Friday Reagan seemed his happy self, nothing unusual.

We went to a fun fair with his big brother and both them had fun. We got home and Reagan’s daddy sat him in his high chair for his dinner and as his dad went give him his food he noticed Reagan was cold and he wasn’t responding properly and started shaking just now and then and then he would turn white.

We both knew he wasn’t cold and I told his dad to try feed him to see how he is. He ate his food, but was still the same when his dad picked him up and he seemed like he was fighting sleep and when his eye were open he was starring, not alert. He had this blue tint was over his own body, it would come and go like waves.

I rang NHS and in the meantime we were trying keep Reagan awake. They decided to send an ambulance and as ambulance men came into our home Reagan made a tiny whimper sound and was sick everywhere.

We got rushed to our local hospital and we sat in A&E for 4 hours before he was seen and the doctors seem determined it was stomach bug and they weren’t doing any tests, all they wanted was a urine sample because he has such a high temp. I felt like no one was taking me seriously, so I took him home and he seemed fine again just a little pale, so we all went to sleep.

I woke up an hour later seeing him that blue colour again all over, but his lips were even bluer and his face was yellow and would then turn blue. So we packed his going out bag and headed off on motorway to a different hospital and within minutes I took another look and he was sleeping - no response whatsoever.

We managed make it minor injury hospital which transferred us by ambulance to another hospital where there was a team waiting for him. He spent 5hrs in resuscitation with 8 amazing people working on him as his oxygen level was low, he was dehydrated and showing classic signs of sepsis. They finally got him stable, then he became sick again and he needed blood transfusions (plasma) as his blood wasn’t clotting.

By this time he had for lines in and fluids, blood transfusions, oxygen and we were all scared but stayed strong as we knew the doctors and nurses were doing everything possible for him.

They then decided he had to go to another hospital to go into intensive care as this hospital didn’t have one, so two amazing men and the driver came in and spoke with us, explained everything and that he might need to be put into coma so he’s safely transported. Thankfully they felt he would be ok awake. He was safely transported over and remained in intensive care for a couple days and slowly went into different wards each day as he recovered very quickly.

What I can say though is my gut instinct did save him but also there doesn’t have to be every sign. The rash didn’t appear until he got plenty of fluids because dehydration can hide the rash and just cause blue tint all over and the rash looks like bruises and that rash was on top of his eczema it can appear on top of that too.

When we got home it was so scary and difficult we had to teach him how to crawl all over again which was heart-breaking. The impact it has on your life is horrible. He’s scared to even get his toe nails cut because he’s had so many needles into him and it’s so important that people catch there coughs and sneezes and wash their hands.

Chelsea Keir
July 2018