December 20, 2012

Long story short, yesterday afternoon he got croup. Over an hour and a half it came on and George felt it was getting worse and took him to the ER where I met them. In the time it took us to rush from the nurses station in the lobby to a room, he had turned blue. The next hour was a mess of breathing treatments and using the blue oxygen bag on him and Clayton freaking out because when the treatments would wear off, he didn't seem able to breath in or out on his own. It was hectic. Croup is not uncommon for him, but it has never been that bad. He has never turned blue from croup. And seeing my child blue twice in a month feels like almost more than my heart can handle.
Thomas quickly sent for USACW's transport team and they transported him here to the PICU. He had five breathing treatments plus steroids at Thomas alone. Then he had treatments that are normally every four hours at two hour intervals once he got to USACW. As of this morning, he has not had to have a treatment since 11:30 last night. They have just stopped giving him steroids to see how he does without any treatment now. He is definitely much better this morning. I won't sugar coat it though, yesterday was bad. Very bad. He usually recovers quickly and yesterday he wasn't; it was different than even just in November. He actually turned blue twice yesterday at the hospital.
The crazy part is that this episode is croup and the November episode was from a fiberal seizure. The only connection is that both events led to severe respiratory problems. The reason we seem to be having such severe respiratory problems now is linked to his scoliosis. With his scoliosis having gotten worse, it is leaving his airways more vulnerable to being constricted at the onset of any respiratory distress. It is turning a bad episode of croup into a severe life threatening episode. As long as nothing is affecting his respiratory function though then the scoliosis doesn't seem to bother it. Thank goodness!
Coincidentally, we should find out this week if Texas Scottish Rite accepted us as a patient for his back. We need this!
Doing better now. Just tired. And a little irritated that I have had to argue with residents about not over loading him with fluids to the point he has urine retention. I have had to be firm with them.

-Tests did show he does not have flu or RSV though.