Judy

Here is a blog about living with Crohns Disease and the realities of life when you have a child suffering from a chronic illness. It's not just about me, the mum (Judy), and our family, but you'll also be able to read my 16 year old daughter Sara's journey with inflammatory bowel disease. And to be fair it is "her" illness and "her" story.

I suppose our story starts in April of this year 2012, when we were called by first aid to pick Sara up from a One Direction concert. We were told that she was throwing up and in severe pain and that we should take her straight to the hospital. 

Friday nights at casualty (at St Vincent's hospital in Sydney) are really not pleasant, but fortunately Sara was seen to quickly and efficiently, once the staff had established she was not drunk and had not taken drugs. Sara was given every possible drug to stop her vomiting and to help her with pain. Her blood was taken, however the doctors were unable to establish what was causing the pain or the vomiting.

At midnight it was decided that she would be admitted to the quieter side of casualty (yes there is one) and spend the night. If she was well in the morning we would be allowed to take her home, however if she was still vomiting further testing would have to take place.

My husband and I left the hospital at 2 am and returned there at 8 the next morning. As soon as she saw us she threw up. And even after a morphine shot, she was still in excruciating pain. Terrible to see your daughter like that. Just terrible.

After an ultrasound we were not any wiser. Her scan showed some fluid in the lower abdomen, but nothing that would equate with her pain. Her bloods were fine except for an abnormally high white cell count. We were told that she would need a CT scan, but though we were not happy about the extra radiation exposure, we knew there was really no other choice.

The CT scan showed a high grade small bowel obstruction and immediately after, we were admitted into a ward under a colorectal surgeon.

While this was just the beginning of our stay in hospital and the first time anyone mentioned Crohns Disease to us, in reality, Sara had been sick for many months beforehand, with bouts of terrible pain, nausea and vomiting. Our GP kept putting it down to a bug, or food poisoning. I had put it down to the stress of starting year 11 and school work.

There were still many weeks before Sara was diagnosed with Crohns Disease, but it was at this point I did refer to Dr Google.

To be continued
- Judy