A Whole Lot of Croup

When my big boy started coughing yesterday afternoon I thought, "Here we go again."  He had croup for the four hundredth time about a month ago, so I was pretty annoyed that it seemed that we were heading down that path again so soon.  At about 9:30, when he was sound asleep, the coughs started coming.  It was only a matter of minutes before they were coming on top of each other.  That wicked croup cough reached a whole new level of horrible that we hadn't experienced before.  It was terribly scary for Noah and incredibly frustrating for Nate and me.  Nothing we tried helped.  We worked with it for almost two hours, and our efforts only resulted in a few minutes of relief here or there.

So, at about 11:30 p.m. Noah and I headed off to the ER.  Why can't croup get bad at lunchtime instead?  It's pretty great walking into the emergency room with difficulty breathing, because you get put to the front of the line.  There was almost no waiting for us. 

But while we did wait, Noah wanted to take pictures. :-)

 Still smiling despite all the misery at midnight. I love this kid.

From the moment he was seen by the triage nurse, Noah was a champ.  He was polite, cooperative, obedient, and even tried to be happy while the constant coughing continued.  The nurse said, "We don't see kids like you, especially at this time of night."  When the nurse was just making conversation with him and asked him about his brother's name he didn't skip a beat and said, "My 'bruder's' name is Lukiepottomus."  I clarified that one.

After a short wait we got some cough medicine, ibuprofen, a steroid and a breathing treatment on board.  Things improved after that.

I think Noah was most excited about the apple juice another nurse brought him.  He kept saying, "Give me some more apple cider please mom."  And he made sure anyone who walked into the room knew he has been to an apple orchard.

Today things were better, except for the exhaustion part -- for both of us.  Hopefully that nasty croup will give us a break so everyone can sleep better tonight.