We were having a normal Thursday. Mike came home from work and we quickly went to go out to eat at Sonny's. Maggie was waving and having fun with the waitress and customers. She was in great spirits when we went to pick out our Christmas Tree at Lowes. We were out past her bedtime so she went to bed with out a bath, no big deal though. She went to bed without hesitation.
We went ahead and put the tree in the holder and brought it inside. Hung out for a bit before we were about to head up to bed. Mike went up first and heard her coughing kind of loud. The fact that she was coughing was bizarre to me since she was so perfectly fine earlier in the night.
Mike went in her room and said over the monitor, "She is coughing pretty bad." So he brought her downstairs. We tried to give her some water in the kitchen and then minutes later, she PUKED! EVERYWHERE! Projectile! It was horrible! I freaked out. It was all over me. I start crying and yelling, "What do I do? What do I do?" I didn't know if I should move, how do I get her to the bath with out getting it all over the place. So I took her upstairs and stripped her down. Her breathing was so hard and labored and sounded horrible. I yell for Mike who was cleaning up the kitchen. I yell, call my mother. I call in tears and wake them up and she advise I call our pediatricians office. We call the on call doctor, who thankfully was our pediatrician. Dr. Deckle heard her in the background and said that we should take her to the ER to get her checked out.
At 11:30, we were out of the house in 2 minutes. We had to pick between St. Joe's or Brandon. Because of her breathing so bad, we decided closer was better. Off we went. We get to the hospital and park. Now why we didn't just drive up to the front, I have no idea. But we had never been to Brandon Hospital and it was dark so we just ran as fast as we could. We got her registered, and I have tears coming down my face as I explained the situation. They saw her in Triage within 3 minutes. Then then had us go back to a room. We waited for the Med student check her out and then the doctor came in and said she had croup. She also had to get x-rays to rule everything else out. This sounds a lot easier than it was. Trying to hold a baby still for an xray is so hard. They had to put her in a metal wrap to keep her bottom still and Mike had to hold her down as they put her in a neck brace. The entire 5 xrays probably took 6 minutes, but it felt like an hour. We went back to the room where she passed out from the ordeal. The Doc said everything else was clear and that we would have to give her a steroid medicine to help her lungs.
We went home at 2:30 and she slept till 7 am.
My parents came down on Friday night and brought dinner. They got to give Maggie hugs and I really think Maggie "knows" who they are and was happy to see them. She gave them both really big hugs. I know I was happy for the hugs and happy to see them. It gave me flash backs from when she was jaundice and Dad brought lasagna down for us. Food and parents mean so much! We are lucky to have them.
We have been in hibernation all weekend. She has been eating fine, sleeping ok for the most part. Friday, Saturday night I have been up for about two hours in our smaller bathroom for our make-shift sauna that has a vaporizer in there. She wakes up with several coughs in a row and I take her in there for about an hour. This usually calls for a diaper change as we sit in the bathroom with the night lite on. She takes everything out of the cabinets and also likes to walk in the very little space while I try to convince her to go back to bed. The sauna usually makes the coughs stop with in 10 minutes and she is fine.
Saturday morning I think I woke up with a sinus infection. Being sick is rough for anyone, being a mom that is trying to take care of her sick baby is a really rough job. The house is a mess, but we will try to get things in order this week. As long as we are healthy by next weekend.... we will be going to Sea World to celebrate her cousin Brady and Belle's 6th Birthday!
(Photo was taken at the hospital)
