Cade's First Emergency Room Visit...

Okay, so this week, each day that I picked Cade up from day care he was progressively getting worse and worse with, what I was calling, congestion. So Wednesday night the ladies told me I might want to take him to the dr because he had the worst congestion of any of the babies. I told them that he didn't have this problem prior to coming to day care. They said they knew but that 2 of the other babies had the same problem and their doctors put them on these breathing treatments that really seem to help. So I'm thinking... okay, I should call the doctor the next day to set up an appointment.

So Wednesday night I put Cade to bed. Next thing I know, it's 12:20am and Cade is screaming like he's being cut open or something. So I picked him up and feel that he is burning up. I kinda freak out because I wasn't expecting it. I run to the fridge and get him some baby ice packs to put on his head. Then I went running around to find the baby tylenol. Well, in my haste, I find the baby mylicon and give it to him! So then I'm really upset and finally find the baby tylenol. So I give that to him. Then I hunt down the thermometer and take his temperature. It says 102.o! So I call his pediatrician and a nurse calls me back. She says to give the tylenol an hour to kick in and if his temp comes back up to 102 or 103, then I should think about taking him to Wolfson's Children's Hospital here in Jacksonville. Now, Doyle and I have known even before he was born, that if we ever had any problems with him that we would have to take him to the children's hospital. I guess because Jacksonville has a children's hospital, the other area hospitals are not really set up to take infants. We also both knew it was downtown somewhere, but had never checked out exactly where. But I digress, let me get back to the story.

So here it is an hour later and Cade's fever has only gone down to 101. So I change out the ice packs and get him some new ones. Another hour passes and I see the fever creeping back up. Now I'm getting the feeling that I better call Doyle. So I call him and we discuss it. While we are talking, his temp reaches 102 again. So we decide I better take him to the hospital. I throw on one of Doyle's white t-shirts and a pair of shorts and off we go. Of course I get downtown and get all confused as to how to get to the hospital. It takes 6 different people on the phone at the hospital before they found a person that understood where I was and could tell me how to get where I needed to go.

Once I arrived in the parking garage I realized I had no idea which building I needed to go to. Luckily, a cop was driving past and he was able to tell me where to go. I walk in and head to the receptionist. She immediately asked me if something was wrong or if my babies diaper was just leaking. I hadn't even noticed that he had pooped out the back of his diaper and it had gone up his back! And of course, in my haste of arriving in the parking garage and trying to figure out which building I needed to go to, I left the diaper bag in the car! So I tell her that I left it in the car but that I can go back to get it. She says no, to check the baby in and they will give me a clean diaper for him. So I give her his information and we sit in the waiting room. We were the only ones there and probably didn't wait for 60 seconds before they called us back.

They ask me a series of questions about his ailments and they take his temperature... it was 103.5! Then the lady asks me "what's going on at home". At that moment, I totally felt like they thought I was some woman that didn't take very well care of her child! So I tell them that I have had the sniffles but I thought I had gotten it from him. So anyway, they admit him and give us a room. To make an even longer story a little bit shorter, they took a urine sample through a catheter and drew blood from an IV. They also used that iv to give him a steroid for what they called "a little bit of croup" as well as gave him an antibiotic for an ear infection that was in both ears! He also received a breathing treatment for the croup as well. I think we got there around 3am and dismissed us at 5am. Not too bad considering we were at the hospital for 5 hours when I hurt my toe.

So we come home and I lay my head down on my pillow to go back to sleep around 6:15am. I had set my alarm to go off at 7:45am to be able to call my boss before 8am. That alarm went off and I was in a complete haze. Cade was still breathing really badly when I called my boss. He couldn't believe that was Cade making that kind of noise. I told him that I would just work at home that day and he said that was fine. So I got up and took a shower and got ready. I drove to work to pick up materials to bring back home. My friend Cameron came out and sat in the car with Cade so I wouldn't have to drag him into the office. That was really good timing because Cade was asleep when we got there anyway.

So we came home and Cade pretty much slept off and on while I worked at the computer. I had a webinar to listen to between 2-3pm. Man, that was tuff staying awake for let me tell you! Then we had a follow up appointment with Cade's pediatrician at 4:15pm. Of course we never get into see the doctor at a reasonable time when we go there. The nurse called us back after a 45 minute wait. Then we waited another 30 minutes before the doctor came in. He agreed that Cade had croup and the ear infections. He gave us a nebulizer for the breathing treatments and another prescription for additional steroids. He didn't like the sound of Cade's breathing. He actually drew me a picture of what croup was. I had no idea. Croup is when the opening to the lungs constricts the airway. It isn't his lungs filling up with phlegm or anything. The steroids are supposed to help with the inflammation. It was just a two day dose. So hopefully that will help. By the time we got his prescriptions filled and home, it was almost 8pm! I had only gotten maybe 3 hours sleep the night before and I was extremely exhausted.

So that was just last night. Cade woke up about every 2 hours fussing around. I would nurse him back to sleep and he would go another 2 hours before waking back up. I stayed home with him today too. He slept alot today as well which was nice. It's a lot easier to work from home when he's sleeping than when he's awake! He did a lot of "eh'ing" when he was awake. The breathing treatments do seem to help. I've got several medicine droppers and realize there is only one that actually works! The one that come with the medicine seemed really easy at first, but when I would depress it into his mouth, I would press too far and pink goo would just roll out of his mouth. The 2nd time went much smoother because I used a different dropper.

Okay, Cade has had his medicine for the night and is sleeping pretty peacefully in his bouncy seat right now. I think I've definitely learned a few lessons from all of this. Don't wait to call the doctor when he sounds that bad. I should have known it wasn't just a cold because he didn't have a runny nose and I barely ever was able to suck anything out of it with the nose sucker. Keep all the medicines in one place where I'm able to find them quickly as well as keep the pediatrician number handy. I need to show Doyle how to get to that hospital as well, but hopefully he won't need to go there again! He has a follow up appt with the pediatrician on Tuesday. Doyle can handle that appointment by himself.

Here is some good news... Cade is growing so much that he is now wearing 9 months jammies for the feet and length! I was able to find some pj's that didn't have the built in feet. So that's probably the best thing for him now. Hopefully he'll be able to wear them for awhile! Yesterday at the dr's office they weighed him in at 16 pounds 7 ounces! Needless to say, he's thriving! Mommies milk definitely packs a punch! :)