Challenges As Parents

Late Thursday night (around 11) Brett was hearing strange noises coming from Luke's room so he went in and found him gasping for air. We didn't know what was going on. As soon as we would get him calm he would start back up again. Struggling and working hard to breathe. I was thinking in the back of my head we needed to call 911 but am a more paranoid mom so I was waiting for Brett to say something. After seeing him continue to fight breathing and sounding like a baby seal (super hoarse cry), and getting sweaty Brett said he thought we needed to take him to the ER. I was throwing my clothes on and Brett was putting him in the car seat. Which made Luke SUPER upset causing his weird breathing spells to escalate. I said I didn't feel comfortable driving him myself with no one to keep an eye on him in the back. (Of course we didn't want to wake Micah and freak him out in the middle of the night). So Brett called 911. An ambulance and fire truck showed up and checked all his vitals and thought he needed to go to the hospital. I went along, and Brett stayed behind with Micah.

They had him on oxygen for the whole ride. We got to the hospital where they did more testing, chest x-ray, etc. He has a horrible case of croup and an upper respiratory infection. The doctors said my worse fear and mentioned this possibly being a tell tale sign of him being an asthmatic. I'm praying to God they are wrong (Brett had HORRIBLE asthma as a kid). Only time will tell, and if things like this start becoming more routine it is a good sign he will have asthma.

 It was an absolute nightmare watching this go down. We were released from the hospital around 3am so Luke and I took a cab home. It was a very long night.  He did not sleep well at all, would only sleep if propped up on my shoulder and would freak out if I laid him down. I kept him downstairs in the guest room with me so Brett and Micah could sleep (in fact they didn't even know we came home). He's on steroids now to help kick the croup. Doctors warned us to be prepared for another awful night which it was. He slept from 10pm-midnight in his swing and then was up till 6:30 a.m (we did lots of steam showers that night).

It is the most terrifying/ horrific thing to see your child struggling to breathe. I hope we never have to deal with that again. The Lord was so faithful. We are so grateful we were placed in a country where we do have access to health care/medicines and pray God grants mercy on those who are not as fortunate. OF COURSE this had to be the same night that I tried sleeping pills for the first time (popped them 15 mins before everything started happening with Luke), so the Lord was also faithful that I felt ZERO affect from them (and DIDN'T drive with Luke in the car). I think my adrenaline was going so crazy the pills couldn't have worked even if they wanted to.

Phew, glad that's behind us!! Lucas is sleeping peacefully right now and seems to be on the mend.