ER Visit

On the way home from my sister's, I woke up to Nathanial barking in the back seat. When we got home, he was very hot and really barking and seeming to have some difficulty breathing. So, we slathered on the Baby Vicks and headed to the shower after getting Noah, Ethan, Austin, and Aidan to bed. We spent an hour in the steam filled bathroom, and he seemed a tiny bit better, but not a lot.

Steve wanted to try to put him to bed and see if sleeping would help him feel better. We laid him down while we unloaded the car and put everything away. Then I listened to him through the monitor and it sounded like he was now barking with every intake of breath. I decided he was going, because he didn't sound well and I wasn't going to sleep anyway. I went in to wake him up and was very glad that I did, because he was having a lot of difficulty by that point.

By the time we got to the ER, he was having retractions and just not breathing well. He loves blowing raspberries, but he was doing it every single time he would take in a breath...like he was trying to get more air that way.

Unfortunately, we had the doctor on call whom we have philosophical differences with. But, what are you going to do? She gave him a breathing treatment and that didn't help at all. Then she waited a while and finally decided that she would put him on Zithromax, prednisone, and a cough medicine "so I could sleep." She gave him the Zithromax and prednisone in the ER. He threw most of it up, but we tried. I was frustrated because I don't want my kids to have antibiotics unless they are clearly needed. She didn't even have a diagnosis for him!

We went home and he did sleep well. I kept the monitor on loud and barely slept, trying to listen to him. I did go back to bed this morning and Steve kept an eye on the boys for a few hours.