A Trip to the ER

Dear Connor,

When your Uncle Tony was about your age, he had to get three stitches in his chin. PoiPoi was giving him and me a bath and kept telling him to stop standing up because he was going to slip and fall. He didn't listen and did in fact slip and fall (See? That's why I am always telling you to stop standing up in the bathtub, too!). Uncle Tony also hit his chin on the side of the tub and cut it open. When PoiPoi realized this, she quickly dressed the two of us and rushed us to the hospital. That was my first and last time in an emergency room.

Until yesterday. You started coughing after you woke up yesterday morning and it didn't sound like a regular cough. It sounded hoarse, raspy, almost like a barking seal. I'd never heard you cough like that before but nothing else seemed wrong and you were eating, playing and behaving like you normally do, so I decided to wait and see if the cough got worse. It got worse. By 4pm, you were coughing more frequently and wheezing whenever you took a breath. I called your pediatrician but he wasn't in the office and the receptionist told me emergency office hours had been that morning (Um, what? How do you have set emergency hours??? Like emergencies only happen on Fridays between the hours of 10am and noon???). She then told me to take you right to the emergency room, so I hung up with her, called Daddy to tell him to come home and then burst into tears. I never knew fear until I became afraid that something would happen to you. I scooped you into my arms, gave you a big hug and shakily started to pack your diaper bag. Thankfully, you were oblivious to my anxiety and just continued to push your toy bulldozer across the floor.

Daddy, you and I arrived at the emergency room a little after 6pm. I had heard horror stories about emergency rooms--when your Uncle TT's appendix burst, the emergency room was so busy that he had to wait seven hours until a doctor could examine him--so I was expecting us to be at the hospital for a long time and had packed your diaper bag with extra snacks, toys, books and stickers. But fortunately, we didn't need any of that because they called you in almost immediately (I guess because you are so young--it'd be pretty cruel to make a suffering baby wait very long). A nurse and a doctor examined you and determined that you have croup, a viral infection that causes your upper airways to become inflamed. I'm pretty sure I turned sheet-white when I heard the diagnosis but the good news is that your case is not serious and that we caught it early enough and could treat it with a single injection of steroids. You obviously did not enjoy getting the shot but several minutes afterward, you were fine and even flirting with the little baby girl sitting in the bed next to yours!

I think about a zillion things every day: what I should cook for you, when our next playdate is, why you don't like wearing socks. But when you are sick, that is all I can think about. Why did you get sick? How much pain are you in? What can I do to make you feel better faster? You seem good today. You are still coughing, but only occasionally and there is no hoarseness or wheezing. I am so grateful that you are getting better and that you were able to be treated so quickly. We were only in the emergency room for about an hour.

And let's make that our first and last time in an emergency room, okay?

Love,
Mom