What began as a normal week went horribly wrong. At our sons 2 month check up, he had so much green goop the doctor sent us to the ER. He was diagnosed with a virus and we were sent home with a suction thingy and saline solution. Fast forward a few weeks. The drainage was still there and I thought it seemed like it was worsening a bit. So on a Thursday morning I called the doctor and took our son in. The doctor checked him out and when he got to his right ear said, "Uh-oh. We have a bunch of fluid here." We left and got some medicine for an ear infection and went about our day. On Friday, I noticed a loose sounding cough but wrote it off due to the ear infection. Ear Infections are caused by fluid being trapped in the ear. That fluid typically comes from a common cold or virus like our son had. It made sense to me that the medicine was doing it's job and loosening the crud...hence the loose cough. By night time, I felt like his cough was a bit worse and not so loose sounding. Again, I sort of wrote it off figuring that by the morning it would be better because he would have 48 hours of antibiotics in him at that point. I was up and down with him through the night. Around 4 in the morning he was not nursing well and I felt the first niggles of worry and doubt creep in. But, he fell asleep and I went back to bed. I heard him up about 5:30. My husband, knowing we had had a tough night, got up with him to give a bottle (gotta love having a great pump!). About 6, he shook me awake and said, "Something is wrong with the Linebacker. I think you need to take him to ER."
And so it began. I came out and saw him breathing really hard. Much, much harder than normal. His head and legs would go up and his belly down and then vise versa. His entire body looked like a see-saw. We could hear a definite rattle when he breathed but it did not sound like a wheeze. But I decided if we were this worried at 6 a.m., we needed to take him in. I pumped, downed a quick bowl of cereal, packed 2 cloth diapers and took off, not knowing I'd be gone for the next 5 nights. Upon arrival I checked him at the ER. No surprisingly we were the only ones in the waiting area. We were called back within 2 minutes. The nurse said, 'Oh he is a congested little guy." Nodding my head, my thought was, "Phew. At least she doesn't think I am a crazy mom." Since it was slow things happened pretty quickly. Vitals, questions and a quick visit from the doctor. The doctor was immediately worried about his breathing and what she heard from the stethoscope. She ordered a nasal swab and a visit from a Respiratory Therapist. They tried one breathing treatment on him with zero change. About that time, they came in and told me he tested positive for RSV. I was not overly shocked or even incredibly worried...yet. Then they said, we need to take him to the Children's Hospital via ambulance. I made the call to my husband and that is when the fear hit. I was choked up and worried. He called into work and told the other kids. He did not know what RSV was and said he was not exactly worried at that moment in time. The ambulance service came in and observed our son and took his vitals. I was then informed we would have a bit of a wait. I had to go get his car seat for the ambulance stretcher and I tried to get him to nurse. The ambulance staff came in and told me they were switching to a higher caliber vehicle "just in case". They were also sending a nurse to ride along with us...."just in case". I was then prepped on treatments that could take place while en route..."just in case". They said that babies as young as our son do fine right up until they are no longer fine. Basically, there is not a real transition, they are fine one minute and then it all goes downhill very quickly. So myself, our 2 month old son, one driver, one nurse and one other person (not sure of their title) loaded up and took off in the ambulance for the Children's Hospital one hour away.
