On Wednesday Dec. 8, 2004 Jackson had a well-child check up and immunizations.  There was a long wait for the doctor and Jackson passed time by pushing his stroller around and around the doctors’ hallways and opening and closing the door to the exam room that we had been assigned. I knew there was no hope of trying to keep him still for that long of a period of time, so I just followed him around to make sure he stayed quiet and out of trouble.  A 3 year old boy had been crying while we were waiting and when Jackson heard him, he searched for the boy to make him feel better.  When we finally saw the doctor, he commented on how active Jackson was.  He pronounced Jackson to be in good health, the nurse gave him his vaccinations and I dropped him off at daycare.  On the way to daycare, he fell asleep in the car and continued to sleep as I handed him over to Bessie (daycare employee).

I picked him up that afternoon and we went to a friend’s house.  Jackson played with toys, watched TV, and stuffed his face with Sun Chips.  We went home, ate dinner, played, and we put him to bed.  That was the last day that Jackson will ever experience as a normal child.

The next morning, December 9, I woke him up at 6:30 as usual.  Nothing seemed out of the ordinary.  I got him dressed.  I fed him a yogurt for breakfast as he watched Sesame Street.  I kissed everyone good-bye and left for work.  Lee dropped him off at daycare around 7:30.

I left work a tiny bit later than usual to pick Jackson up from daycare.  As I pulled up, I noticed emergency vehicles on the street in front of the daycare.  I parked & ran up to the building thinking that there may have been a fire, but as I approached I could see people inside and I relaxed.  I just figured that the emergency vehicles were there for the Duncan Donuts across the alley.

I got to the door of the daycare and Georgia (always my least favorite day care worker) said “here is the mother” and to me she said “your son is at the hospital, he had a seizure”.  I can’t tell you all of the different thoughts that flooded my head at that moment.  It was all so unreal.  I remember thinking “why didn’t anyone call me?” and “how could this happen?”.  I was trying to find out what happened and get to the hospital, but this cop is trying to ask me a million stupid questions…name, address, phone number, etc.  She also assumed I didn’t speak English and was shouting for a translator before I told her I speak English fine.  I asked her what happened but she doesn’t tell me anything.

Georgia comes out and is trying to give me directions to Our Lady of Resurrection (ORL) and then asks if I’d like her to go in the car with me.   I agree, but just then a CFD comes up and says that he will drive me to the hospital.  I ran to the car to get my purse and then go with him.  I am so thankful that he drove me there!  All the way there I kept trying to reach Lee.  I got his voice mail the 1^st time, hung up, and called right back.  I got voice mail again and left a message.  It was hard to hear because the sirens were on.

He dropped me right at the ER door and when I went in, a nurse started to ask me the usual questions…name, address, phone, insurance.  A doctor (I’m sorry that I can’t remember his name because he was really very nice) interrupted and told me that before I went into the room to see Jackson I should know what to expect.  He told me that Jackson had stopped breathing and had to be intubated.  He said that a nurse was pumping a bag that was essentially doing the breathing for him.  He said that he had to be sedated in order to intubate so that he was not conscious.  He also said that there were marks called patichea all over his face.  While he was talking, Lee called me back.  It turned out that he had gone home sick from work that day.  Someone gave him directions to the hospital.

I went into the tiny, crowded room.  I saw my sweet Jackson lying on the table naked except for a diaper and a bracelet that says “Baby Doe”.  He looks so small and still.  He had a cervical collar on to hold his neck and head still.  There were a lot of people in the room working on him.  They brought a chair for me and I sat and held his hand and tried to stay out of the way and cried.

When Lee arrived it was obvious that he was in bad shape.  He could barely stand up for more than a minute and he was sweaty and sick to his stomach.  A nurse came and gave us kleenex and ice water.

A chaplain came and asked if I would see the daycare workers, who are now gathered in the ER waiting room.  It is a Greek family daycare.  Greeks have large families so there were quite a few people there already.  Georgia tells me that Jackson had been put down for his nap at 1:15.  When they tried to wake him he was blue around the lips and they could not wake him up.  Georgia’s brother Nick tells me that they won’t cash my check from that week (yeah, I’m so worried about THAT at the moment!)  I told them I had to get back.

OLR has no pediatrics so Children’s Memorial has sent a transport team to bring him there by ambulance.  I ride in the ambulance and Lee drives his car there.  The whole time someone is squeezing the bag that breathes for Jackson.  At Children’s in the ER they ask us millions of questions.  They x-ray him a few times, do a CT scan, run a ton of tests.  The tissue at Children’s is the worst!  It is very small, thin, and rough as sandpaper.  I went though about a thousand tissues!

Jackson is admitted to the PICU.  We have one of the corner rooms with double doors.  I had never been there (or any ICU) before but even I could tell that those were the rooms for the really sick kids.  Our next door neighbor was a little girl who got a kidney transplant while we were there.  I hope she’s better now.

They had absolutely no idea what was wrong with him.  They felt that it could have been foul play or neglect on the part of the daycare because of the marks on his face and neck.  Police and DCFS were called by OLR.

They did a million tests the first few days…Spinal tap, MRI, blood tests, EKG, EEG, skeletal survey.  They thought for a while that he might have an unusual presentation of diabetes because his blood sugar was so high.  We were pretty happy about that (not to diminish the seriousness of diabetes, but it is something that can be named and treated.)  They pricked his little toe every hour to monitor his blood sugar and even started him on an insulin drip, but they ruled that out within a day or two.

They also ruled out a heart problem, infectious causes, and seizures.  One doctor indicated she was concerned about brain damage because the EEG showed slow brain waves.  I think that she was the only doctor who ever actually mentioned the words, and I can understand why.  That evening was one of the worst for our emotional state.  Dave and Kari brought us a nice dinner that night and all we could do was pick at it and cry.

The next day he made some improvement and they soon moved us over to a regular PICU room.  They weaned him from the ventilator and began to feed him through a tube that goes down through his nose into his tummy (NG tube).  A doctor from PST (protective services) came to take photos of the marks on his face and neck and we slowly began to learn more details of what happened at daycare that day.  We were also interviewed by police detectives and by a DCFS investigator.