Thank You

As some of you know, we spent Wednesday through Saturday at the hospital with Leighton. Leighton became sick with a little cold on Monday. My aunt was staying home from work so she kept him Tuesday so LJ didn't have to go to day care. He woke up with a fever Wednesday morning so I stayed home from school with him giving him meds and breathing treatments. When Josh arrived home from work around five, I went ahead and drove to Jasper for my night class since it is only once a week. I hurried home because Josh had a coaches meeting. When I got home, I could immediately tell Leighton's breathing had gotten much worse. After Josh had left and I was home for a few more minutes, I began to panic because his breathing was so labored and he was belly breathing majorly. I called Josh and told him I was taking him to the ER. He informed me that he didn't think he needed to go because he didn't notice any labored breathing while he had been home with him! (Glad I went with my first instinct...he figured I was just overreacting because I tend to do that sometimes:) After hanging up, I thought a little more about it and decided I would talk to the pediatrician on call before leaving. I called and after answering some questions, she decided I should come to Jasper to meet her. So of course, I'm starting to panic. I drive to Josh's meeting, get the insurance card, fill up my gas tank, and off I went with one sick little boy. Now that I think about it, I should've had someone go with me because his breathing was really scary but I panicked and went ahead. I think I got there pretty quick because when I called the pediatrician, she was surprised I was there already and almost to the hospital. She called us in a courtesy patient so when we got to the ER we got right in. After having a chest x-ray, they determined that Leighton was in the beginning stage of pneumonia. I must say that I am pretty proud of myself because I stayed pretty calm. I'm assuming it was because I was the only one there and I didn't want him to see me panicking or scared. I immediately called Josh and he left right away. The pediatrician came in and said his oxygen is pretty low so he is going to have to be on oxygen and steroids for a few days. So our hospital adventure began...he was admitted and off to the pediatrics floor we went. We got settled and then it was time to get his IV going (worst part of the whole stay). Since he had a high fever and was dehydrated, his veins were clammy and weak. The nurses tried four times...one in each hand and upper arm. My poor baby was miserable; screaming, telling them to stop because his arm hurt. It broke my heart. They had to call the Pediatrician at one in the morning to have her come in and try. It took her three more times...once in each foot and finally got it in his hand...to make seven:( I felt bad after leaving him on the fourth try but I couldn't handle it anymore. I knew if I didn't get out I was going to yell at the nurses or take Leighton off the table and hold him and say no more. I could only stay out for about 30 seconds before going back in because I couldn't handle being away from him either. Finally we're back to our room! In comes nurses with the oxygen hose. This was quite a trip too...however, he forgot about it after awhile so it wasn't too bad. We ended up getting to sleep around two a.m. Thursday morning. We seen little improvement on Thursday. His oxygen was still low when we tried to take him off of it. He wasn't eating anything and just laid in bed most of the day. Friday, after the doc came in, he wanted to try to take the oxygen off again and see how he did. His levels stayed up "ok" all day. By Saturday morning they were up to almost 100. He was starting to act like himself again. I was so relieved and thankful for this. The doctor came in and said we could go home after he got his last antibiotic in his iv. I want to thank everyone for their prayers, cards, gifts, and visits. I was suppose to attend the Walk to Emmaus this weekend as well. I couldn't leave my baby at a time like that, but I had very supportive people around me and the whole Team praying for us. Oh yeah, did I mention that I got sick too so I decided to go to the doctor on Friday and I was diagnosed with bronchitis...when it rains, it pours!