Hospital Tour #1

Unfortunately, since Cohen's birth our house has been filled with illnesses.  It has been since September since we have not had someone on any type of medication, Asthma is mostly to blame but viruses have also taken their toll.  Everyone but my big bullfrog have been through the trenches of sickness....especially our newbie! 

Cohen became sick sometime after New Years and spent 7 days on breathing treatments.  I thought he had RSV and took him to the doctor.  I was shocked to find out that it was just a random cold, because of how sick he was and how hard it was for him to get over it.  When we went in for his well visit a few days later....he wasn't so well.  He had x-rays and was swabbed for Pertussis.  During this visit our pediatrician called in "our" pulmonologist to have a look at our sweet little guy.  After listening to Cohen the pulmonologist diagnosed him with two separate health concern; the first was Layrngomalasia (loose tissue in his larynx which can cause noisy breathing and other issues).   He informed us that it was important to get his reflux under control because it causes more inflammation in the esophagus making the LM worse. Then he paused and took a deep breath and said the "A" word, which made chills run down my spine.  He is very familiar with our family history (they call us their family of wheezers).   He knew how hard it would be for me to hear that our newest addition didn't get left out of our gene pool.  I didn't want to believe that he could have Asthma too....and so early!!!

A week later Cohen started getting sick again, in fact all three girls were sick as well.  I had four children on breathing treatments every four hours, which makes for very little sleep if any.  It didn't take long for Kayla's Asthma to completely spin out of control and by now the little ones were pretty sick too.  After taking the girls and Cohen back to the doctor we learned that the two littles had indeed come down with RSV. 

Little did I know this was just going to be the beginning of a difficult two weeks.  Since daddy had to be in Charleston for a convention we decided to pack up the sickies and stay in a hotel so that mama wasn't on all night rotating nebulizer duty by herself.  So, I loaded up the gang and began what turned out to be a very long stressful drive.

Not long after we were on the road Kayla started into a very scary Asthma attack.  I had Todd on the phone preparing to meet me at the ER in Charleston.  After two attempts with the inhaler I decided to break out the nebulizer,  which finally gave her some relief.  It is so hard to watch your child struggle, knowing that there is nothing you can do to help them.

We decided that she was out of danger and I proceeded to check into the hotel....me, and five little ones.  Yes, it was quite comical to say the least.  After I had everyone settled in I noticed that my littlest was breathing extremely heavy and realized that for the first time in my life I was watching one of my children experience retracting (when the abdomen pulls away from the ribs in attempt to breath in more air).
I sent a video to Todd (who thought I had just sent him a YouTube video of retracting).  When I assured him that it was his son he sent me straight to the ER (apparently we were destined for that place).

We soon learned that Cohen's RSV had progressed into pneumonia.  My poor baby had to endure 5 grueling iv attempts, one of which ended with blood all over me.  It was so hard to watch my poor sweet little man go through so much.  I had been in that same ER so many times when I was pregnant with him, I never would have imagined that I would wish that suffering back on myself, but I would have gladly traded places with him in an instant!

Spending time with all my bullfrogs and butterflies!
So technology isn't all that bad...lol!

Cohen was admitted into Women & Children's Hospital on Saturday.  His treatment consisted of  iv antibiotics and breathing treatments, as well as oxygen.  He stopped eating entirely for a few days and then could only tolerate a few ounces from a bottle (he only had a bottle once before this), nursing and breathing was still to hard for him.

It didn't take me long to figure out just how severely understaffed the hospital was for the immediate need of caring for all of these sick little ones.  I will save you the agony of hearing a frustrated mother rant, but needless to say it was far from a positive experience...much to my surprise!  Not being able to be treated by our regular physicians only compounded the matter for us because of Cohen's other health issues.  I had a difficult time having my concerns addressed during our stay and despite his dropping oxygen levels the decided to discharge us from the hospital.

Going home... or so we thought!

So on  Tuesday afternoon we headed for home...

Psalms 34:19 Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord delivers him out of them all.