Scary Day

The day of Cloee's party we had a little bit of a scary thing happen to our little girl. Cloee and I were going to pick Cade up from the bus stop (half day kindergarten) and then head to the grocery store to pick up the food items for the birthday party that evening. While we were in the car waiting for Cade's bus to come Cloee started coughing a lot. When she stopped I could tell she was having a hard time breathing. After we got Cade I decided to run home and give Cloee a breathing treatment before heading to the store. It actually took 2 treatments to open her up. We went to the store and by this time Cloee was getting cranky and it was nearing time for her nap. I tried to be quick but with 2 kids along that is nearly impossible. As I was about half way through the store Cloee started getting antsy so I carried her on my hip the rest of the time. She would occasionally lay her head on my shoulder but other than that she seemed fine. She did have quite a few coughing fits though. That should have been my first clue but in my own defense a coughing fit is not always followed by her having a tough time breathing. So just when I was about to go up to pay Cloee had a really bad coughing fit and was becoming weak and laying on my shoulder and acting kind of lethargic. I had the bagger girl put my groceries up on the conveyor belt and tried to see what was wrong with Cloee. When I got a close look I realized she was having a terrible time breathing and her lips were turning blue. I tried not to freak out and thought maybe she was just cold therefore that's why she was a little blue and tired which was why she was weak and lethargic-like. I paid and instructed the girl to follow me to my car and put all the groceries in very quickly while I put the baby in her car seat. I booked it out of the store- leaving poor Cade behind. I kept yelling to him to run faster because Cloee couldn't breathe. I was trying not to freak out. I told Cade to make sure Cloee doesn't 'fall asleep' on the way home. While we were driving I heard "SLAP SLAP SLAP SLAP SLAP" Seriously it was like 6 or 8 times. Was that what I thought it was? I asked Cade, "How's Cloee doing?" He responded by saying, "She was trying to go to sleep so I slapped her. It keeps her awake mom." She didn't even make a peep when he did it, although it sounded worse than it really was. It was soft slaps, but still!!! I also heard him back there with her saying, "Don't go to the dark side, Cloee. Stay where the light is." That made me laugh. But he was also nervous and asked me a few times if she was going to die. Such the worried brother he was. When we got home I rushed Cloee inside, seat and all, and immediately held the breathing treatment to her face and was able to get a good look at her. She had fallen asleep on the way home (nice job Cade, you were supposed to keep her awake!) and her lips were still terribly blue and she wasn't breathing deep at all and it was just really awful and scary. By the third continual treatment she seemed to have started to open up and was getting really good breaths.
SUCH A SCARE!!!
Within an hour she got a fever of 103.5! Then not long after that people started showing up for her birthday party. That night she went to bed around 8:30 and was up at midnight and never went back to sleep. We did treatment after treatment, which usually puts her to sleep, and she was still up! I tried putting her to bed but she would toss and turn. In my arms she would flip and turn too which was so annoying to me. I even tried nursing her even though I was cutting down to once a day-(first thing in the morning). Finally after many treatments that weren't working I decided at 5 am to take her to urgent care. We got there at 5:10 and apparently it closed at 5:00. DANG! It was near my mom's so we went there and I went to sleep and woke at 8 to call the pulmonologist and make an appointment. Then I went back to sleep until I had to take her to her appointment. I was soooo pooped!!!
So the doctor thought she probably just had a virus. In almost all cases a virus comes on quickly and leaves fairly quickly and causes you to be quite miserable and causes a high fever- usually 102 degrees and above. An infection on the other hand usually comes on gradually and lingers and isn't really too bad to deal with and causes a low grade fever 99-101 degrees. I knew this but was mostly concerned about the lung issue. What if one of her lungs had collapsed or something? The doctor didn't really think the lung thing had anything to do with the fever/virus since she has issues with her lungs like this all the time. She thinks there is some allergy that is triggering it- so now I need to figure out what it is (I was thinking maybe one of the fruits or plants at the store perhaps). I got instructions on what to do and how many treatments I can give- before I was worried that I was giving her too many- but now I know that I can give as many as it takes but it should really only take a maximum of 3 in a row.
Fun stuff!
On a side note... I was telling Tiffany about Cloee's issues and said, "Yeah it's all just a joke. These treatments, medications, fevers (Cloee has a low grade fever about 5 out of 7 days a week and we have no clue why) are just a joke." Tiff looked at me straight in the eyes and said, "No Cari it's not a joke. It's reality and you need to realize that." So I am working on realizing my reality and trying to get this little one all better!