When good IVs go bad

Kaedra decided she wanted to get up at 4am this morning. Since the bed was soaking wet again and she needed to be changed, I decided to let her, at least until I could clean her all up. In the process of that, I noticed her IV dressing was coming off. I called a nurse and a nurse showed up promptly to put some coban on it. (as a side note, this nurse is the ONLY nurse that Kaedra has spoken to right away and not completely shunned. She wasn't even our nurse, just a helpful nurse that heard what we needed.) After a few minutes, the dressing was still coming off and when I went to push it down, Kaedra cried and said it hurt. I called the nurses again and they came in and realized that the IV was no longer a "good" IV. Her hand was swollen and red and obviously in pain.

Now it's not so bad to get an IV out. However, Kaedra screamed loud enough to wake up the people 3 floors up.

No, what's worse is getting a new IV in.

Our nurse asked a nurse to come over from the PICU to do it for us. She kindly did and is probably still regretting it. Kaedra's veins are very hard to find. They hide from anyone holding a needle-like implement. Although I sang Kaedra almost every song in my repetoire, I am not sure she heard much over her crying. Poor baby. I wish I could do this for her. Eventually the nurse did find a vein. At that point the bed started to look like a crime scene. Somehow the little vein managed to get blood everywhere.

She is now asleep again, exhausted from her early morning torture session. We are supposed to go get an x-ray in a few minutes, so I am not bothering to lie down again.

Hopefully I will be going back to my busy at-home, no-time-for-blogging life soon. But, until then, plan on hearing from me. I have nothing better to do than share everything with you!