We'll have 'Serious Illness' for $1000, Alex...

That's what I was thinking last night as I was 'enjoying' the quiet and watching Jeopardy in my daughter's hospital room. Yes, you read that right. My baby girl is in the hospital. It all began over two weeks ago with Ace waking up on Sunday the 6th with an icky icky cough. I kept him and his sister apart and germaphobic/OCD hand washing and sanitizing began. The next day the cough was just as bad and more frequent, and accompanied with a fever. :( I kept him and his sister a FLOOR apart for three days. Fast forward to Wednesday and the boy was diagnosed with pneumonia, given a shot of antibiotics and a 10 day course of them as well. Poor kid! He was super sad, but woke on Thursday morning far more himself and on the mend. Whew!


On the mend!
Mae went to her two month appointment on that Thursday and was diagnosed a happy and healthy baby girl. Whew! Then Saturday night rolled around. Rats! She for sure had a cough. Sunday, we were resolved that she did in fact have that same cough that her brother did. Monday, I took her to the doctor to confirm it was 'just a cold'. We prayed that it wouldn't go into her lungs and that she'd be able to have a far milder version. Unfortunately on early Wednesday morning, I woke to feed Mae (who had been sleeping on me while I slept sitting up for the last two nights) and she was breathing rapidly. She had 58 breaths in 60 seconds. Not good and she was having trouble catching her breath after a cough. We woke up her brother and we all loaded in the car and headed to the local ER.

We arrived and took us right back. They assessed the rapid breathing and noted that her oxygen levels were in the low 80s. They handed me a mask to hold over her face while they worked to get xrays (negative for pneumonia), swab her for influenza (negative) and RSV (positive), and try to get a line in her (just in case.) The poor dear. The doctor the determined that due to the low levels in her oxygen saturation and the RSV - that we needed more specialized care and ordered an ambulance to haul myself and Mae over to Children's Hospital. A first for Mae and mommy, we climbed into the ambulance and headed to Children's ER.


She fell asleep on the ride over

She was smiling and playing with me
Upon arriving they took her off the oxygen since she was back at 100% and were hoping she'd stay there. They did a little suctioning for more tests and diagnosed that she had bronchilolits. She continued to nurse just fine, which is a blessing and calmed down and started to snooze and her O2 levels dropped again. She was put back on the O2 and it was confirmed that she would be admitted.

By 12:30 we were in our private room on quarantine. RSV is a very aggressive virus and so they do not want us sharing a room (and we didn't want to either, so a blessing amid the storm that it wasn't even a question that we'd have our own room.) Mae continued to snooze and get some rest. The nurses started to suction her to help get the mucus out of her nasal passage and her mouth. This has helped her tremendously. Loving Husband went home to get me some things and then after his return, went to Pop Pop and Gran's to get our boy, they had met us at Children's to grab Ace and take him to their place for a far better and entertaining afternoon.


Sleeping on her dad

A beautiful sunset to watch from our room
Mae's night was less than pleasant. She required deep suction several times within an hour. They attempted to take her off the O2 around 2am, but had to be put back on within the hour because she wasn't holding the saturation levels. We finally got a good stretch of sleep at 4am - 3.5 hours. After that she woke and had a good meal and then back to sleep (and she's still snoozing.) This has allowed me to get a shower, brush my teeth, get breakfast and update everyone on how she is doing.
Sleeping in her bed
Overall, she is doing ok, she has coughing fits that are heartbreaking and she hates the suctioning, but the good times still outweigh the bad. The suctioning is just to help her clear it out of her system. The nurse this morning said she looked and sounded great, although she has had another icky fit leaving her breathing heavy. We just need to get her off the oxygen and to not have quite so much mucus before we can go home. She isn't coughing terribly much and is currently resting comfortably. It's unknown how long we'll be here, but we rest comfortably knowing the Lord is in charge of our little girl and that she is in good hands here at Children's.

She's still pretty happy amid all this