Hospital adventures.

Twice, last week, we had to take Kenley to the Emergency Room. It started out with a slight fever at daycare. When I went to go pick her up to take her home, she had really rosey cheeks and was sporting a wet washcloth on her head. She was still in relatively good spirits so we went home and had some tylenol and play time.

She went to bed that night, crying a bit and wanting some extra hiney pats. About 10pm she woke up and we had our first-of-the-night nursing session. I noticed she was breathing very fast and was still slightly warm. After about 10 minutes, she typically is back to sleep but I noticed her eyes were wide open and she was still breathing fast. I brought her into our bed and Andrew and I discussed what to do... I wanted to bring her to the ER but Andrew just wasn't sure yet. I thought she was wheezing so my mind was made up.

We arrived at Portsmouth ER around 11:15pm and when we went back to the initial screening the nurse scared the bahjeezus out of Andrew and me. She explained that Kenley was retracting and while babies are very strong, they can get tired very quickly from all of the effort and tire out and just stop breathing. Even though she scared us, she quickly got us a bed in the ER and had the nurses set up a nebulizer treatment. Kenley took the breathing treatment like a champ, even though she was super tired.

We also participated in some baby torture. It was the worst. Andrew, unfortunately, had to endure the brunt of it. An infant chest x-ray is terrifying, strapped into a seat with their arms pinned over their heads. I hope that no baby has to endure this. The doctor's also wanted to check her urine so Kenley had to be brave and have a catheter. She was not brave. Neither was I. I stood outside the curtain (and looked frantic I am sure) waiting for it to be over. They gave us a diagnosis of "could be swine flu" and sent us home with a Rx for tamiflu and tylenol.

We started the next day as we normally would... getting dressed, off to baby school and work. I went to see Kenley at lunch time, for our lunch date and the ladies in the room said they were going to call me because she was breathing fast again. I decided we needed to take Kenley back to the ER because her breathing was no better than it was the previous night. I got Kenley in the car, we picked Andrew up and made our way back to the ER.

This time, we did not have as much baby torture. Kenley had two breathing treatments over the course of 6 hours, the second helped more than the first.

Andrew and I were tortured by this weird Corpsman who was our attending nurse. I can't even describe how weird he was. At one point, he asked Andrew 'Do you like the way I am providing you service?' We both rolled our eyes a lot that afternoon. The pediatrician who came down to review Kenley's case was great. He knew exactly what was going on and we appreciated his knowledge. Kenley was tested for RSV as a precaution, he gave her a steroid shot and we waited around for the test results. Kenley and I were resting on the bed so Andrew decided to go get a bite to eat. While he was gone, of course, Kenley woke up. We were playing with some of the toys that we brought when Kenley started coughing, which turned into choking which of course turned into gagging and then up came a huge vomit. Awesome. Now she was sitting in her own vomit and no one was around to help me. Eventually, a nurse walked by and he helped me clean off the bed while I got Kenley back in order. At the end of this trip, we left with a diagnosis of bronchiolitis and were prescribed prednisone, an inhaler and more tylenol.

She did ok during the morning on Saturday and Sunday, helping fold the laundry and playing like usual -- it was just obvious that she was not 100% yet.

We finished our meds this morning, after a rough weekend with little sleep by all. Andrew is working nights right now so thank goodness my mom (Grammy Hawk) is here to help me.

Today, Andrew and Grammy took Kenley back to the doctor for a follow up. We had a suspicion something was not right still because she wasn't sleeping at all (like 4 hours TOTAL Saturday night) and she wasn't eating well. The doctor said that she had a double ear infection now. Looks like the ear infection from two weeks ago lingered and was not affected by the amoxicyllin she was taking. Tonight, she went down a bit easier -- she is exhausted from the weekend and is feeling a bit of relief with her z-pack antibiotics and some ear drops that are,according to Andrew, like orajel for the ears.

I really hope that she gets better soon... I hate seeing her so cranky! I need more wrinkle nosed smiles in my life.