Croup

Elena had a major case of Croup that started on Friday, during the morning would could tell she had a little bit going on and she has had it before but it just goes away during the day. This time it got worse during the day. Our sitter called to tell me that it was getting bad so I went and picked her up and made an appointment for her. When I picked her up she was excited to see me and she said "momma!" her voice was so hoarse and I felt so bad! She was still pretty content thought so that was good at least. I took her to the doc and he told us it was for sure Croup and he prescribed some anti-inflammatory stuff so that she that if it started to get worse she wouldn't have to go to the ER. He tells me that they are tablets and that I will need to crush them and put them in her food because they taste nasty. Well I took her to Wal-mart to meet up with Todd because he was already going to fill up a presciption for Christopher who had to go to an Oral Surgeon that day because one of his Crown's busted and he needed it out immediately. I then went back to work.

Todd was keeping me updated on how Elena was doing and he said he was having a hard time giving her the medicine because she could taste it. She seemed to be doing ok but was pretty wheezy, then when I got home she still sounded terrible and we were just hoping that the medicine was working and that she would be fine. During the night we had the humidifier going so that it would help her out a little more and Saturday morning she was pretty much the same with the wheezing and the terrible barking cough, she was still very playful and content. Saturday night however was not so great....as soon as she fell asleep she started coughing and coughing. I told Todd that if she got worse I would take her into the bathroom and start the shower with hot water so she could get more humidity there. It was about 2:30am or so when she started up again and got worse. I picked her up and asked her if she wanted to go into the bathroom and she says "yeah" like she really knows what I am talking about. I took her in and turned the closet light on and I started the shower. She just stood there waiting patiently for me as I did what I had to do. Then I sat on the toilet and put her on my lap and sat there waiting for the steam to start. Elena just sat there and occasionaly would turn her head around and look up at me and smile as if she were thanking me for helping her out in the middle of the night. It was cute!

We were probably in there for about an hour when I decided that it was probably enought to help her out. She slept the whole night through after that. Sunday morning we could hear her breathing and it was really wheezy and when she woke up we tried to give her the meds in some yogurt but she could taste it and wasn't having any more. Todd was concerned that it would just get worse so we took her to the Urgent Care to see if they could give us something else because we knew that the tablets were not going to work out. We got the the Urgent Care and we had to wait forever! I was so sleepy I could hardly stay awake and there is Elena running around as if nothing were wrong. We had to wait even longer for the freakin' doc to come in! Finally he comes in checks her out and prescribes the liquid stuff. He thought it was pretty dumb of the other doc to prescribe tablets and I thought it was weird too but I just assumed that maybe they didn't make it in liquid form. Anyway, we finally left and filled the new stuff and gave it to her when we got home. She started doing better and slept somewhat well that night. Monday I stayed home with her and Tuesday as well (I got sick too). After we got the new stuff she has been waking up during the night and her head is so sweaty, her hair is totally wet! I don't know if that is a side effect or if it has to do with her being sick. Right now she is hating the meds because not only does she take the anti-inflammatory but she has been on preventative antibiotics for the last month to keep her from getting ear infections.

Today she woke up pretty happy but now she has a nasty cough and it is really phlegmy, yuck! She also has a runny nose and we think she might also have a sore throat because she doesn't want to eat very much. Will it ever end!?