sleep. That left Sonja with nursing duties, which included an almost hourly
trek back and forth to the bathroom with Colton. Cassie had gotten sick
only one other time during the night, but whatever this bug was, it seemed
to have latched onto our little boy’s innards and dug in deep.
We checked out of the hotel early and drove over to the Greeley home of
Phil and Betty Lou Harris, our close friends and also superintendents for
the Wesleyan church district that includes all of Colorado and Nebraska.
The original plan had been that our two families would attend the Wilsons’
church together that morning. Now, though, with a pair of sick kids, we
decided that Sonja would stay at the Harrises’ home. Betty Lou, sweet lady
that she is, volunteered to stay home and assist.
When I got back from church just after lunch, Sonja gave me the status
report: Cassie was feeling a lot better. She had even been able to eat a
little something and keep it down. But Colton continued to vomit on a
clockwork basis and had been unable to hold anything down.
Colton was in the Harrises’ living room, huddled in the corner of the huge
couch on top of a blanket/drop cloth with a bucket standing nearby just in
case. I walked over and sat down beside him.
“Hey, buddy. Not doing so great, huh?”
Colton slowly shook his head, and tears welled up in his blue eyes. I
might’ve been in my thirties, but over the last few months, I’d learned only
too well what it was like to feel so sick and miserable that you just wanted
to cry. My heart hurt for my son.
“Come here,” I said. I pulled him into my lap and looked into his little
round face. His eyes, usually sparkling and playful, looked flat and weak.
Phil walked over and sat down beside me and reviewed the symptoms:
abdominal pain, profuse vomiting, a fever that had come and gone. “Could
it be appendicitis?”
I thought about it for a moment. There was certainly a family history. My
uncle’s appendix had burst, and I’d had a wicked case of appendicitis in
college during the time Sonja and I were dating. Also, Sonja had had her
appendix out when she was in second grade.
But the circumstances here didn’t seem to fit the bill. The doctor in
Imperial had diagnosed him with stomach flu. And if it was appendicitis,
there would be no reason Cassie would be sick too.