Crap! Its Croup

Apparently little preemie lungs don't fare so well with croup :(

Jeff & I were taking bets about Hayden's first ER visit being for a broken bone or stitches from his climbing habit.  However, we were wrong.

Apparently we caught some little bug & while it just gave Logan & Livi a nice 12 hour fever, a sleepy evening & a little snot.  (Oh the joys of being 1 & sticking everything in your mouth.  Germ-fest!  Building immunities I guess?)  It settled right into Hayden's chest.  Livi is our wheezy baby (however after our flu & now this ordeal I'm starting to buy into the benefit of her inhaled steroids).  He is our croup baby.  He always sounds croupy with colds.  Nothing new.  Cough-cough-bark-bark.  But after his fever toped out at 103.5 & he wouldn't sleep, was crying & was restless, would not let Jeff hold him, I could not put him down ever, I watched him retracting between his ribs & in his neck for an hour at "rest" & even after some albuterol (which I gave because I had it however it apparently does nothing really for croup) & sticking his head in the freezer he was still wheezing & had a stridor so loud GG could hear him over the phone.... at 2:30am I finally took him in.  I couldn't stand it anymore.  Restlessness & retractions=respiratory distress in my book.  I worried I would be the "dumbass" in the ER at 2am over "nothing".  But I'm so glad we went.  We tried out the Children's ER this time.  Creighton has seen enough of us lately & I didn't really feel like visiting there at 2:30am!

For a variety of reasons for which you are about to hear, this was probably our worst ER visit to date.  We were there for over 4 hours.  Longest trip to the ER yet.  It was 2:30am.  I was tired & cranky.  And Hayden was a terror.  I know he didn't feel well but seesh.  Kicked, screamed, cried, hacked, coughed, bucked.  It took 2 of us to hold him down for a breathing treatment of Racemic Epi.  (Talk about heart rate of 220 for a while after terror & racemic!)  All the while his breathing sounded so horrible I felt awful fighting him.  He kicked, swung, bucked, coughed, hacked, held his breath.  Miserable.  He has scratches from the ordeal.  But oh he sounded better afterwards.  So.Much.Better!  He actually slept for the first time all night.  And I no longer could see his ribs protruding as he breathed.  Still hacking & a little wheezing, but at least now he was comfortable. 

Then they decided they wanted to give him steroids, which is when our luck got worse.  I knew oral steroids tasted awful after my battle to get Logan to take them last week.  They mixed it in some cherry syrup & told me it would taste just fine.  Went down ok.  Then after about 45 seconds & 4 bouts of gagging.... it ALL came back up, twice.  All over me.  My shirt.  Down my neck.  Dripping down my into my bra.  Soaked.  Missed himself, just got me.  Juice, raisins & steroids.  Nice.  At least it wasn't milk.  I just sat there covered in puke so thankful I had brough him juice/water & not milk.  So then they decided they had to give him a steroid injection since he just puked up every last drop of the oral dose.  She brought in another nurse & it took 2 of us to hold him down & one to give the shot.  The boy is strong.  Then he proceded to cry, hold his breath & throw such a hacking, coughing-barking fit that none to my surprise, he puked yet again.  And yet again, all over me.  Poor baby.

We packed up some saline to give cool humidity nebulizer treatments.  I donned a disposable, paper scrub top the nurses were nice enough to find me as to not go home a complete soaking mess.  And home we went.  And crawled into bed at what was now 7am.

Today.  Much, much better.  Still hacky.  No fever.  And besides a little overtiredness & clingyness, all seems to be well.  I think by tomorrow we'll be all better (knock on wood).  This was a quick one.  His lungs just didn't like it.  Logan has a little snot & Livi is perfectly fine.