Frequent Flyers

We have become frequent flyers at our local pediatric ER. Last night M woke me out of a lovely sleep with a slightly panicked "Have you HEARD this?" A had the croup. It was actually the first time M had ever really heard the croup in all its glory and was suitably horrified. We quickly whisked A into the steamy shower and I waited for it to work the miracles it always worked with C. Five minutes, still barking cough. Ten minutes, still barking cough. Fifteen minutes, still barking cough and we managed to set off the fire alarms in the house. At 20 minutes with no improvement what.so.ever I called the on call nurse and calmly asked what else I should try. "Steam?" Check. "Humidifier?" Already running. "Elevated crib?" "Check. "Hmm. Cough syrup...wait, is that the cough? She's been doing that for how long? Oh, my. I hate to tell you to go to the ER but where do you live? Ah. You'll go to the lovely pediatric ER on a hill? I'll call ahead for you so they will have a room ready for you."

When your pediatrian's office offers to call ahead to the ER for you, I figured it was probably time to go. A and I raced off, and in what seemed like much too long a time for the middle of the night we arrived. And she stopped coughing. I called M from the parking lot, wondering if we should just turn around and go home. The ER at midnight, not fun. Not ideal. Not our beds. But then she started coughing again and in we went.

Needless to say, that was, of course, her last cough of the evening. And, once we were inside the doors of the ER, we were kept for observation for two hours and administered preventative steroids. While I sat there feeling like dumb overreacting mommy. We were finally released, and A got to spend another night in our bed. "Well, at least she'll sleep in after losing three hours of sleep," I thought. And she did, for a whopping hour and fifteen minutes.

On the upside, I no longer have to figure out what to wear to her cousin's baptism extravaganza this weekend.