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| trooper |
Not surprisingly, our posts usually focus on the trip highlights
and happy moments. Even during the
“down” times-- the stress of getting to a new place and trying to figure things
out, the long boring transport days, sniping at each other because we’re “hangry”
and/or have been within arm’s reach of each other for a week—it’s all pretty
much part of the adventure. But getting
sick so far away from home when we can’t speak the language and the medical
facilities are a different standard (if there are any to be found) is the
monster under the bed that we don’t want to think about and are most afraid of.
We’ve had a few issues- including some painful/messy traveler’s stomach, random
allergic reactions that necessitated the quick administration of Benadryl, a
course of antibiotics for both kids to kick lingering coughs, and a mysterious
circle on Xander’s thigh that we thought was a bug bite but was apparently a
fungus. Although not pleasant (ok, some
of the stomach stuff has been downright miserable) these ailments have been
short-lived and somewhat predictable (maybe not the circle fungus)-- but we
never would have predicted what happened this past week.
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| bionic man |
We arrived in Cusco, Peru (elevation 11,400 feet) on
Sunday. We had a nice day walking around
the city on Monday and all was well.
Monday evening Xander went to bed with a headache. Both kids were
coughing through the night. By Tuesday
morning, both kids were coughing a ton and Xander was wheezing a lot. He’s had some asthma in the past, so we
treated him with the albuterol and steroid inhalers that typically alleviate
his symptoms. Liam was uncomfortable and threw up. By about 10am we took a taxi to the hospital.
Before we left, Xander was pretty much passed out on the bed, shockingly pale,
breathing incredibly fast and shallow. I
had to carry Liam on my back down the three flights of stairs from our
apartment to the street because he was so weak.
They just both went downhill so quickly.
When we got to the clinic, they rushed them both back into
the emergency room. Liam threw up again
all over everything. Xander’s pulse ox
was under 70 and his lips were turning blue.
They immediately put him on a high flow of oxygen and gave him an IV. They took Liam and me to a different room and
put him oxygen and gave him an IV. The nurse had a really hard time finding his
vein. He was very brave with the
multiple needle pokes. Chest x-rays of both kids showed fluid in their
lungs—high altitude pulmonary edema. A
rare and very dangerous form of altitude sickness.
Altitude sickness?
These Colorado born and bred kids that spend every other weekend in
Winter Park? Unimaginable. Both kids in the hospital at the same
time? Inconceivable.
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| bundled up for a transfer |
Xander had to go to a different hospital because he had to
go into the ICU. His heart and breathing
rate were so high, they were worried that his diaphragm would stop
working. I stayed with Liam and Jim went
with Xander. Jim and I alternated at the
different hospitals. We could text each
other, thank goodness. Any elementary
Spanish I know was lost in the fog of sleeplessne
ss and worry. I
could ask “What is happening?” but not really understand the answer. I made the mistake of looking up pulmonary
edema on the internet. I have never felt so incompetent or as horrible a
parent. Liam broke my heart by crying
for the first time only when I told him we probably wouldn’t get to go to Machu
Picchu. Through all of this the kids
still want to continue our adventure.  |
| Hyperbaric chamber |
Along with oxygen, IV steroids, diuretics and antibotics for
Xander (to fight pneumonia) both kids got several treatments in a hyperbaric chamber. For some reason they didn’t take either of
them to the chamber until about 9pm, which was really exhausting. Liam couldn’t hear anything in the chamber so
I typed things into my phone and held it up to the glass. He’d write back with his finger on the steam
on the inside of the glass. The second
day he wanted to bring in his tablet but they wouldn’t let him because it could
spark inside the chamber and make it explode (high oxygen and pressure). Xander had to go to a different hospital in
an ambulance to his chamber. Riding in
an ambulance late at night on the streets in Cusco is not an experience I would
recommend to even the most intrepid.
There are five clinics in Cusco that treat high altitude sickness—just
the fact that there are multiple hyperbaric chambers within a few kilometer radius
is telling. The kids received good care,
since they’re on the road to better. One
of the main differences between hospitals in Cusco and at home seemed to be the
electronics. For example, the IV was
gravity fed, the head of the bed went up with a crank, and the xrays were
printed on film. This also had the
advantage of being a lot quieter—for example, no jarring beeping when an IV ran
out, and they didn’t come in and check every few hours through the night. Jim and I slept in the extra bed in their
hospital rooms. In the ICU, they gave us
a separate room in the hospital in which to sleep. I guess electronics (or US
healthcare) come at a much higher cost.
All of Liam’s treatment and two nights at the hospital cost about $2000,
Xander’s treatment and two days in ICU and one day at the clinic cost about
$3000. It would have cost at least 10
times that in the US. We paid $250/kid with our travel insurance. So
there’s that.
They are both doing ok.
Xander, not surprisingly, is wiped and queasy from the antibotics. One
of the primary treatments for high altitude sickness is to go to a lower
altitude, but we flew here, and Lima is a 20+ hour bus ride away. There was a lot of uncertainty about where and
when we could go places. Additionally,
it was a lot of effort to unravel the plans we had already put in place. We are currently in Urubamba, in the Sacred
Valley, which is about 2000 feet lower than Cusco. Luckily, Machu Picchu is even lower (about
7500 feet) so we will be able to go there.
My sister Tracey and Scott are currently on their way to Cusco and we
can’t wait to see them tomorrow!
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| Sacred Valley- brighter days ahead |
We decided to come home a week early and will be back next
Friday for a few weeks. The kids want to
go to Mesa Verde with our “free” week because they said it would be interesting
to compare the two ruins. They also
said they want our next family trip to be in Peru so we can do the travel we’re
skipping this time around. They are troopers. As for me, I’m still a bit shell
shocked. I cannot put into words how frightening
this experience was. I so do not want to
it to tarnish this trip or our love of travel.
I want to focus on what we’re doing for
them instead of what we’re doing to
them.
One of our school things is to work on spelling and
vocabulary. One of Xander’s words last
week was “resilient” (the only reason I just spelled that word right is because
I practiced it with him.) Probably when
we go home they’ll boast about going in a hyperbaric oxygen chamber as much as
riding an ostrich. Hopefully I can live up to the kids’ example.
