Like Father, Like Son

Jack had a migraine for the first time last night.  I picked him up from the gym day-care after Zumba.  He said his head hurt above his right brow.  I asked him to get a drink of water and he got nauseated.  Shortly after we got home he was sobbing in pain and vomiting. I called the on-call pediatric line and after an hour got the nurse triage.  Jack had been cycling bouts of head pain and vomiting, no other symptoms.  I thought it was a migraine, but when we talked to him with the nurse he more complained of nausea, so she thought it was a stomach virus that’s been going around.  She instructed me to take him to  be seen if the head pain came back.  At 9:15 he started having head pain again.  It wasn’t as bad, and it was hard to keep him awake, but we decided to take him in now while the near-by urgent care center was open, instead of having to drive to Children’s Hospital in Aurora after midnight.

Jack was lethargic, nauseated, and not very responsive at the care center.  His vitals were all normal.  When the NP came to check him out we could barely rouse him from his sleep. I told them he was a very heavy sleeper and hard to wake up when he’s healthy.  She thought his history sounded more like a migraine and went to start treatment – IV fluids, IV Toradal, Benadryl, and Zofran.

I expected Jack to fall asleep again.  Instead he started exploring the room, asking me things, even smiled.  Within a few minutes he was giddy, w on manic.  I called the NP for that neuro check and he passed perfectly.  They cancelled the med orders and brought in blue gatorade.  He hadn’t been able to handle any fluids all evening but now was ravenously thirsty.  We stayed for 20 minutes under observation to make sure he kept the drink down and didn’t have more pain.  Jack got an official migraine diagnosis and I got instructions for when this happens again.

We’re very happy it wasn’t anything more serious.  Ben said he also feels “better than normal” when his headaches pass.  I guess Jack just rested and vomited enough to recover on his own. I’m glad that happened before they placed an IV.  We got home around midnight and woke up tired, but all normal and happy this morning.

That was the first time I had to take either of my kids to the urgent care center/ER -almost seven years.  I consider ourselves blessed and lucky.  We have migraines on both sides of our family, though none in childhood as far as I know.  I hope we can figure out what triggered it for Jack.  I wasn’t with him in the day care when it started.  He thinks it’s from running super duper fast with a friend.  He says it was faster than he’s ever run before and the headache started right after that.  Who knows?  Headaches are weird.