When you're child gets sick - Constantly

I don't know about anyone else but when my child is sick my heart hurts for her. I'd like to think many are already nodding their heads.

This winter has been absolutely horrible to Anastasia. If it's not one thing it's another. We were seeing her doctor pretty much bi-weekly from September to December. About the 5th visit for another respiratory problem I was seriously contemplating my mothering skills. Logically I know I'm a good mother and we are very hygienic especially with a Cat and a Dog on top of a baby who likes to eat and walk.

Hearing your child have problems breathing is an anxiety I can't fully explain. There are two things that have come up since I've joined the motherhood club. SIDS (that's cooled off as she's gotten older, only because of knowing the stats of her having issues now) and any kind of respiratory distress.

In September she was slammed with pneumonia which was a hosptial visit that made my head want to spin. From the miscommunication that this was an emergency (apparently they put her as non emergent when the nurse checking her in said Emergent. We were really worried about the entrovirus as it was making it's rounds in our county. My baby girl's breath was labored and her Osats were between 89 to 94. We spent 6 hours there when it should have been 2. We left late late at night with a diagnosis that it was just a cold (after a chest x-ray was supposedly reviewed by the radiologist). I was skeptical at best because no cold I've ever encountered sounded like my daughter did. 2 days later I get a call that they reviewed her films again and she has pneumonia significantly in both lungs the left being her worst.

Any ways I'm going on a long spiel and this isn't the point of my post. So she started out with pneumonia, it took roughly 2 weeks to clear up and 3 weeks where there was no noticeable congestion. Then 2 weeks later we hear the congestion or as I like to call it 'purring'. I'm so scientific... We started her back on her nebulizer and there was no improvement. We knew there's a possibility to get pneumonia again easier after you've already had it once. This time we didn't wait and got her in the next day after her symptoms got to this point. Prior to it was 4 days of a cold, runny nose and slight coughing but nothing that would make us worry. We found out after that trip that she had croupe. I thought pneumonia was bad, but croup just made my anxiety go through the roof. As a person with Asthma I know the feeling of not being able to breath and as you can imagine it can be scary. But at least I know when to cough to help clear my lungs. She started doing the sharp breaths and made sounds that just hurt to hear. She was struggling to breath and all we could do was nebulize her every 4 hrs and take her out to the cold in between. This worked and I really REALLY had to have Paul keep my sanity in check here. Because my mind was in flight mode and I wanted nothing more then to scoop her up and take her to the ER, begging them to help fix her. We were smart to ask our doctor when we should bring her in and those signs weren't present. Knowing those signs helped me to navigate my anxiety and not make a rash decision/ project those anxieties onto her and her situation.

When she got over her croup 2 weeks later she started again with another cold and this time a fever. Our doctor made a call and had us start her on budesonide we didn't want this to go to her lungs yet again. So she was on 2 meds. Albuterol and Budesonide (Pulmacort). During this time I struggled with knowing why this was happening all the time. I worried what her daycare would think about us as parents. I worried I was doing something wrong for her to be sick so much and with such horrible upper respiratory diseases. Did I not bundle her up enough when we took her outside, did she not have enough blankets when we had her in the car. Was the new home we moved into a problem? Were the cat and dog an issue? Did we not clean enough? This was a constant and honestly it's still on my mind.

But after a sit down with our doctor she gave us pats on the back and gave us accolades I wasn't searching for but needed to hear. I needed to hear I was a good mother and non of this was our fault. She let us know that, and let us know how attentive to her we were. That she feels she couldn't ask for better parents for a child. Then it was suggested we go to an Asthma and Allergist specialist. Suddenly all my worries kind of went away. I don't know why I didn't think of it. I have asthma and Paul has HORRIBLE allergies especially as a kid.

We're now in the process of working with her specialist and I have to say what a difference her new protocol is making. I have hopes that this regiment won't become such a part of our life. I hope that it's a temporary need as It does suck to have her on 2 nebulizer meds and singular sprinkles every day. Hoping that we can fix this and find a maintenance protocol that involves as little medication more specifically steroids as possible. But in the end whatever will help keep her lungs and her overall healthy we'll do it for however long we need to.

Having her sick this year has been a challenge, another one I didn't anticipate being such a personal hurdle for me to overcome. We now feel like seasoned veterans and I can truly see how people who have second children are so much more relaxed because they've been through it once before. They know the drill, there's a little less unknown from that perspective.