The grandparents descended Thursday night to visit, which was lovely. Friday we all went to Disneyland, where we had a good time. We had the little boy-centered itinerary: Winnie the Pooh, Pirates, Buzz, Tarzan's Treehouse, the train.
At the end of the day, as we were talking about going home, I went to put a sweater on A. He was retracting. C and I took A over to First Aid. We walked in and the three RNs on duty took one look at A's breathing and sprang into action. One of them got us into a room while another got an oxygen tank and the third called the paramedics.
So we were sent via ambulance to the ER about 8 or so. I rode with A. He was pretty scared. They hooked him to the gurney and wheeled him out; if I'd been thinking I would have walked ahead of the gurney so he could see me. C followed with the grandparents in the rented minivan.
Anyway, at the ER, they hooked A up to oxygen, albuterol, and steroid treatments. The nurses were really kind to us and the doctor actually had a respiratory therapist come down to administer treatments. A fell asleep around 10 or so.
He ended up having four or five albuterol treatments and three steroid treatments. His oxygen level didn't stabilize until 1AM. At 2, they discharged us. C, A and I spent some time discovering that the 24-hour pharmacies listed on the sheet Disney had given us weren't 24-hour ones, before C and I realized the only take-out restaurant we'd seen open was a Jack-in-the-Box that said, "Open until 3AM," and figured we'd better get something to eat since we hadn't eaten a meal since lunch at 2:30. I went to sleep with A on the sofabed.
A woke up at 6AM and freaked. Strange room, no Daddy (Daddy was sleeping in the other room). C and I got up and calmed him down, changed him (since he was soaked through his one set of clothes), then took him out to get his meds since the doctor had recommended getting drugs into him first thing in the morning. It took forever to find an open pharmacy because the Neverlost navigation system lies.
Anyway, pick up the grandparents, try to have breakfast but decide the host is skeevy and A's beginning to labor his breathing again. Okay. We debate going back to the ER or going to our own pediatrician's office and decide on our pediatrician. We stop by the hotel and get cereal for A and two bad donuts for C and me. C also gets coffee, very important.
We drive from Anaheim down straight to the doctor's where he gets another treatment and is sent home, where he's okay since then. He's been managing with his inhalers since then and has been much better. It's just not exactly the fun weekend with the grandparents we had in mind.
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2 comments:
You sound so much like a nurse, "retracting". I hate how bad the kid got. It is that brown LA haze! Keep him home. Better yet, bring him to Florida for his Disney fix. I'll meet you there!
Yeah, well, I can be taught vocabulary--especially when it's mildly life-threatening terminology that medical people seem to take seriously. I'd call it purple wasilliwaiting if that got him medical attention.
The mom in the bed across from ours had a now-grown son with asthma diagnosed around the same time as A was, and she was a Godsend. She told us that her son frequently had asthma attacks at Disneyland because of the smoking areas, the rides with gases for effects, and the fireworks. All those combined with the smog can do a number on airways. I hadn't even considered it until she said this, but it made sense.
But a week later, he's fine, off his inhalers, so things are good.
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