Catching up again

I felt like I was back into a routine of blogging, here on my family blog and my food blog as well. Then Christmas came, which brought lots of family to our house and we were busy. Then Chase got sick.

I had slowly increased his nebulizer treatments over about 1.5 weeks and then Monday night he had a rough time. Tuesday morning we had a neb treatment at 7:30am and he was still struggling to breathe at 8:30am. I called our pediatrician and we were there by 9:30am. They gave him oral and inhaled steroids, administered another neb treatment (usually we go 4-6 hours between treatments) and still no change. Off to the ER we went.

After another neb treatment in the ER and Chase falling asleep, the Dr determined he was fine and sent us home around 2:00pm. We dropped off prescriptions, grabbed some lunch and headed back to the house. 15 minutes later, I had to give another neb. Still, he struggled to breathe.

I called our Dr and asked, "What am I looking for to determine if he should go back to the ER?" The Dr told me to give him a few hours and if he wasn't better to go back in. Within 15 minutes of being off the phone with the Dr I had determined we couldn't wait a few hours, we couldn't even wait an hour....this kid couldn't breathe. He walked around grunted, coughing and struggling to get air. So I packed us a bag, grabbed some reading material, a change of clothes and headed out the door again.

5:00pm we're back at the hospital where we were met by the same people we had seen a few hours before so they knew this was serious and did not make us wait for anything. They took us right in and started more neb treatments. After a series of nebs about 1-1.5 hours apart they realized he wasn't getting better and it was time to admit him.

We finally had a room by 10:00pm. When we made it upstairs I chuckled as they led us into the exact room we were in a year early when Chase was hospitalized with RSV. We settled in and was hoping to calm Chase down. Fat chance! This kid was hopped up on steroids and albuterol and was finally in a space that he could move rather than having to sit on my lap for 5 hours in the ER. He was bouncing off the walls! Andy and Koryn came out to give Chase a blessing and he would not sit still...it was like hitting a moving target.

I did get him to sleep by midnight and the respiratory staff came in every 2 hours to administer a neb. I was so grateful that someone else was giving him nebs because I needed a break. It felt so self-indulgent to have someone else do that for Chase because I felt that I should be doing it, but I was just exhausted.

The long and short of it, Chase did better as the steroids kicked in and we were able to stretch his nebs out over a longer period of time and made it home around 5:00pm the next day.

I love this picture. I have one of Al holding Connor, as a newborn, in a NICU rocker just like this.

This is a hospital crib/jail cell. There is a nice handmade quilt in the corner that was donated by Project Linus and we were able to take it home.

This is Chase getting into EVERYTHING! Here he is under the sink-we couldn't keep him from climbing in and out, in and out, and in and out!

Here is Chase on day #2. There was a nice little playroom across the hall from our room. He enjoyed being here.

I hope this New Year begins with a healthier family!