School Holidays



Daniel as a Knight, the latest project from Kindergarten.

Sadly the school holidays have started... Daniel was enjoying Kindergarten so much and really starting to participate in things and it goes and finishes for summer!

On the bright side we can go home to Italy for a few weeks and get away from the noisy builders across the road. Who knowing our luck will probably holiday while we are away and come back with renewed vigour and noisier machines....

We have had a week that has encompassed all the seasons in 5 days and been quite productive too.
The week started hot!!! So I decided ......after a false start last weekend when we took Daniel to a huge park in a sand pit.... we were rained off! As we huddled under the sun umbrellas with the thunder crashing around us, no jackets, umbrellas, jumpers... change of clothes... we eventually ran for the tram. Yes we didn't even have the car nearby, "More fun for Daniel!" my words, which I later ate as we stood dripping!!!

Back to my decision to try the sand pit park again... so I invited a friend and her son along for some company . Off we set again on public transport, no rain forecast! This is nearly always the best part of any adventure for Daniel... Tram!!
The park was really good, too hot to really enjoy as at 35 degrees, metal slides become unusable and sand is quite hot under Bare foot... however the water feature was a welcome coolant!

My friend complained most of the afternoon about "the heat", "the other parents not watching their children", "the arrival of a kindergarten group", "the heat", "how she prefers cool pools", "THE HEAT" ... all from the shade of a sun umbrella under from which she didn't move!
Lesson learnt choose carefully people to accompany us in future!

Rant over, I have missed out the Train journey home complaints and the ice cream eating as I don't want to appear a ranter! Daniel and I had a really good afternoon and will return to said sand park and take Daddy!

I have just remembered we had a trip to the Children's Zoo while my Mum was still here. Paul was in charge of photo taking ... some interesting snaps!? The baby horse is still alive... I think.

So I was inspired to write this blog as we took our first step on the road to Israel with Daniel. Yesterday we met up and had a workshop with one of the therapists from Israel here in Zurich. Hila was here helping another family and we all met for a workshop together and dinner. It was great to catch up and meet another family going through the process like us. Hopefully we can continue in the future to meet up.

Paul enjoying a little glass of Prosecco after the workshop.

We are also starting to think about our next step on this long road, and the planning of a therapist to come and spend a week with us, here at home.

I have been allowed a few hours off this morning as "The boys" are enjoying some time together in Kindercity. Hurrah!
Slowly I am writing my things to remember list... and piling up the stuff to take with us... Driving home to Italy on Tuesday... double Hurrah! Aunty arrives Monday and EDT for Tuesday maybe 5.30am, eek.

I can't imagine much blogging will take place during our break, so Happy Holidays everyone.

Life at home

Our week started so well!

Highly motivated to continue the therapy, keep on track , follow our sessions, make a plan of who does what when.... Daniel went back to Kindergarten happily, My mum came to stay.

Sunday, Monday , Tuesday all floated by quite happily!

Then Wednesday rolled in, it started with " Not well Mummy", from Daniel with a very sad face. Ever the strict mum - "you will eat breakfast and go to Kindergarten, you are fine here is some Calpol." (just for phsycological effect more than medicinal!)
OK Breakfast didn't go down well , neither the toast or the half yogurt but again this is really nothing unusual for our picky food son. So teeth brushed, face washed, jacket on.... "Not very well Mummy" nearly in tears..... OK go lie on sofa with Spencer (The well worn teddy bear).
Little did I know then....
Cancelled coffee with my friend as Daniel didn't look up to it. Must say my mum also was not great whilst here but that is another story.

Then the day took a turn for the worse. Daniel vomited what little he had eaten for breakfast, and this was then followed by the start of a seizure.
I didn't pick it up very quickly and called Paul " Daniel's not right". I am not sure what I expected him to do from work , over the phone. As I talked I could see Daniel slowly worsening so I gave him some "drugs" and called the ambulance, it is at this point my heart usually hits the pit of my stomach.... If you don't like medical dramas stop reading NOW!

10 Min's later the paramedics stomp in fully geared up, out come the oxygen mask, the heart monitor, the oxygen saturation monitor goes on.... they ask the questions, read his notes.... "Is his breathing normally like this?" "Is he normally this blue colour?" . I answered No to both! So there was no surprise when the next statement was "I think we should go to the children's hospital in Zurich."
So we had to wait for the emergency Doctor to accompany us in the ambulance, because 3 paramedics are not equipped/willing to cope alone with Daniel. So in the ambulance, IV put in on second attempt. Daniel had another seizure... more "Drugs" to calm him down.

Luckily for him he "slept" thru' most of this, he did miss the ride in the ambulance, with the sirens going all the way to Zurich. The one bit he would have enjoyed!
Paul met us at the door... "What was the hold up?" He had caught the train from work and arrived before the emergency vehicle. How good is public transport here in Switzerland?
Emergency department in Zurich Kinderspital, for the first time ever we were not admitted into the treatment room with Daniel. They said its good to let the Doctors do what they need to do, we will leave the door open and you will be kept up to date. Well 40 Min's later the door ominously closed. Another heart stopping moment for us.
We were updated, no reassured. a couple of time by nurses. One and a half hours later, the Doctor came out to tell us they had been trying to put in 2 more IVs, and had had to put in a catheter (this is a central line in the groin area)..., a third seizure... more "drugs" needed. The good news from the Doc was Daniel was breathing on his own!!! A shock for me as I hadn't thought about the possibility that they may need to intubate him... And he was being transferred to ITC.

Daniel has been here before so at least it was semi familiar surrounding for us. Daniel spent 24 hours in ITC, Paul pulled night shift, but he couldn't really stay all night with Daniel so he had a parents room down the road... of course it was a wet night, I had borrowed his umbrella, he had no jacket and he was called up to Daniel twice in the night as he had woken up alone and distraught... understandably!
Paul's shirt didn't get to dry between trips up and down the road... it was still damp when he gave up trying to sleep at 5.45 in the morning to go sit with Daniel.
Daniel was in a room with 3 small babies, and the surgeons turned up at 7am to do an emergency operation on one of the babies... Daniel wouldn't let Paul go, physically. So they put the screens up and Paul and Daniel had to endure the sound effects. Normally Paul can't watch the gory operations on "Casualty", so it was a bit traumatic.

Thankfully Daniel was making a good recovery through out this period, by breakfast he was asking for seconds.
So numerous tests, scans, EEG's, ECG's, blood, urine, more tests.The Doctors were stumped as to why Daniel had suffered the seizures, maybe a virus, maybe dehydration, maybe something else. He has Epilepsy.

Thankfully after lunch he was moved to the General ward. However because his temperature had been at 39.2 in A&E, we were put in an Isolation room. With 2 other possibly contagious people and not allowed out to play!!! It is hard enough to keep even a sick Daniel in bed when he knows there are toys around the corner.
A long 24 hours later, a talk with the neurologists, a check over by the student Doctor, some bizarre hospital food, the IV's came out and we were discharged!! Phew.

Needless to say life has been in the slow lane since then.
We are getting back and building up to normal routines, kindergarten etc.
Daniel went to Physio therapy this afternoon, and she noted that Daniel had made some positive, noticeable developments following our therapy in Israel, which was a real boost for us and gave us some proof

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