Journey to and Through Motherhood: Lily's 43rd Week: The Croup (12/21/09

Per Kirsten, Lily just wasn’t herself on Monday. She still had her runny nose but went to sleep okay that night. I was up until after midnight making fudge for Rachel’s school holiday party. I had only been asleep for about an hour when Lily woke up around 1:00am screaming. We were able to calm her down and get her back to sleep but she kept waking up crying harder than I have ever heard her cry. We didn’t know what was wrong with her. She was gasping and having some stridor when she was crying but I thought it was just because she was crying so hard. Then around 3:30am she started having trouble breathing even when she wasn’t crying. We knew at that point that we needed to take her to the ER. Paul wanted to come with me but we didn’t want to wake up Rachel and drag her along so we called my parents and asked if they could come down and stay with Rachel. I got dressed and rushed out the door with Lily and Paul planned to join me there in an hour once my parents arrived. ER trips usually take forever so I was amazed when Lily and I were rushed right in. We never even sat down in the waiting room. Lily fell asleep on the drive to the hospital and was still sleeping peacefully when I was checking us in so I felt like an idiot at triage when I said that I was there because my baby couldn’t breathe. They took us right back, nonetheless. She slept through getting her blood pressure taken but then woke up when I had to strip her down to get weighed and have her temperature taken. Once she woke up, she began to have labored breathing again. The nurses said that she probably had croup. That diagnosis had crossed my mind once the stridor started but I was surprised because she didn’t have the telltale barking cough. In fact, she didn’t have a cough at all. Once her vitals were taken, the nurse escorted us right to a room in the Pediatric ER where a doctor was already waiting! He diagnosed croup then his superior came in right as he was finishing with us and confirmed the diagnosis. The nurse came in right after they left and gave her oral Prednisone then we were on our way home. I called my parents as we were leaving and they weren’t even to our house yet! They changed course and went to Meijer to pick up a humidifier to help Lily breathe. It was one of those things that I didn’t get off of my baby registry and always meant to buy. Paul was awake the entire time I was gone, waiting to leave to join me, so I called him to let him know that we were on our way home already and sent him to bed. I got home around 5:00am and caught a short nap on the couch with Lily sleeping upright on me then woke up shortly after my parents arrived. I tried to let Paul sleep in as long as possible but he still only got about two hours of sleep. I called work and told them that I wouldn’t be coming in and told them to be easy on Paul as he was very sleep-deprived. I then called Kirsten and told her that Lily had croup and that she would be staying home with me. Kirsten wasn’t surprised as she knew that something was wrong with Lily. She gave me some good advice as Nate used to get croup all the time.

When I finally got Paul and Rachel up, Paul was very groggy and Rachel was very surprised to see my parents as she had slept through the entire ordeal. My parents had picked up Tim-Bits from Tim Horton’s on their way over so we all had breakfast together. My parents didn’t stay for very long as my mom was having a lot of problems with her foot. It had been sore for over a week but when she was getting dressed to come over to our house, she stepped down on it to get her pant leg on and heard it snap. She was then in a lot of pain and could barely walk. So they had to leave after helping with our ER trip to get her to the doctor! Unfortunately, her medical experience didn’t go nearly as smoothly as mine. After a ton of problems and miscommunications, it turned out that she had apparently fractured her foot two weeks ago and then broke it further that morning. She remembered it hurting after stepping off a curb wrong so that was probably when the initial break occurred. I felt awful that she got hurt trying to come help us. If I hadn’t called for help, it may not have happened. Even though they confirmed that her foot was broken, they won’t put a cast on it until she sees an Orthopedic Surgeon. She can’t get in to see him until the 31st! Until then, she isn’t supposed to put any weight on her foot. That’s impossible! They said that she is too old to safely use crutches (nothing like adding insult to injury) and should use a walker instead but how the heck do you use a walker without stepping down? She borrowed a walker from a friend and, thankfully, has my dad to help her around. She was helping my grandmother as she is still recovering from her knee replacement but now my dad is in charge of both of them. My mom was very frustrated to say the least and had a lot of stuff she wanted and needed to get done before Christmas that she now couldn’t do without great difficulty. I felt so bad!

Meanwhile, the Prednisone made Lily quite sleepy so she spent most of Tuesday sleeping upright on me as it was easiest for her to breathe that way. Unfortunately, I never got to catch up on my sleep as I couldn’t get comfortable enough to sleep sitting up. Lily was very clingy and cried every time I tried to put her down. Crying made the gasping and stridor return so I pretty much had to hold her all day. I didn’t eat and only set her down to go to the bathroom when I was desperately close to peeing my pants because I wanted to keep her from crying. There were only a few times when she actually wanted down to play for a very short period of time. Then she would start feeling bad and want to be held again. Lily didn’t want any solids and only wanted to nurse all day for comfort. As I was home hungry, groggy, and still in my pajamas, Paul was super busy at work despite my request for mercy on him. He was exhausted all day as well. At least Rachel had a good day! It was the last day of school before Christmas break so it was basically one big party all day. As soon as she got home, I quickly threw on some clothes, strapped Lily in the carseat, and drove her over to her friend Katelyn’s house for a sleepover. Rachel had to fly out to her mom’s house on Wednesday morning so Tuesday night was her only opportunity to see Katelyn while she was in Michigan spending the holiday with her dad.

Paul and I turned in early on Tuesday night but Lily could only sleep sitting up again so I was up most of the night with her. I let Paul sleep for a few hours then woke him up and forced him to take over as I was going delirious from exhaustion. I got about two hours of sleep before Paul had to leave at 5:30am to pick up Rachel from Katelyn’s to take her to the airport for a ridiculously early flight to South Carolina. He had Wednesday off work to do this so I knew that at least he would be able to get a nap later in the day. I was supposed to go to work that day. After Paul left, Lily actually let me lay her down to sleep which meant that I could get a little more sleep too. I called in to work to see if I could come in a few hours late because I was so tired that I seriously feared crashing the car on the way to work. Thankfully my boss noted that it wasn’t a very busy day and graciously said that I could just stay home. Thank goodness! I called Kirsten to let her know what was going on then got another hour and a half of sweet sweet sleep before Lily woke up. Lily wasn’t 100% back to normal but seemed to be feeling a lot better on Wednesday and continued to improve as the day wore on. She seemed less congested and was breathing a whole lot better. She was able to lay down for her naps and spent more of the day awake and playing and less time wanting to be held. I checked online and found out that my camera would be arriving by UPS that day so I spent most of my day running to the window every time I heard a vehicle. Finally it came early in the afternoon. I was so excited that I nearly hugged the UPS guy! I put the camera on the charger then we headed over to Kirsten’s house to exchange Christmas presents with them. She got Lily a cute outfit, some adorable Santa pajamas, a butterfly toy, and some no-skid slippers for their wood floor. They gave us a bag of yummy cookies. Paul ate almost all of them before we even left their house! Christina had called and said that the CD of Lily’s Christmas pictures was ready so we headed over to her house after leaving Kirsten’s. She was out to dinner for her birthday but her sister was at their house watching the kids so I picked up the CD from her. We then made a quick stop at Target. Paul waited in the car with Lily while I ran in. While leaving, I ran into Christina! We always seem to cross paths at Target. I first ran into her there a few years ago around Christmas-time. That was the first time we had seen each other since college and had no idea that we lived in the same area. Then we saw each other there again about a year later which started our renewed friendship. When I got home, I reviewed the pictures which I posted earlier. I love them. I was very thankful that she photoshopped out the tears and the snotty nose. I then played with my camera for the rest of the evening.

Paul and I took Thursday off of work as it was Christmas Eve and we automatically get Christmas off. I only ended up working one day this week but it was an exhausting week, nonetheless, staying up most nights with a sick baby. The rest of the week was full of holiday events which will be posted separately.

Here are some pictures from this week (minus Christmas, of course).

Lily playing with my old popper toy on Monday evening. She loves it:

Getting up close and personal with Blue’s Clues. She loves to point at things on the screen:

Lily was feeling a little better on Tuesday afternoon and was very curious about the new humidifier:

Finally feeling good enough to play (no her foot’s not mangled, she’s just a little too short for this sleeper):

Terrorizing Reiley and Nolan on Wednesday:

Then she moved on to playing with the magnet for the drawer locks in the living room which we keep attached to the metal baby gate:

She is strong enough to pull it off and loves to play with it. One of her favorite things to do is to throw it back at the metal gate and watch it stick: