Well, time to say goodbye to a VERY stressful year. Any of you feel differently? Anyway, let me tell you about our last couple of weeks. Cassidy has been doing better (finally) and for the moment her asthma is under control. HOORAY!!! She has been approved for the new medication, but we are still figuring out all the details. We will probably start in the next couple of weeks. I hope it will make the difference that her doctor is expecting.
Our Christmas was fantastic. Most of my brothers and sisters were home. My kids went to their grandparent's house the Saturday before Christmas. They had a great time. Apparently they had a gingerbread house building contest. I thought their houses looked great.
We had our normal extended family over for Christmas day. Everyone ate way more than we needed to, but it was SO good. :) It was fun to see everyone.
Now to my favorite part. My family is very large and loud. We all went to Nick and Krista's house for Christmas and pirogi. (We can it something else, but I have no idea how to spell it.) We had seven kids from 4 months old to 14 years old, 10 adults and lots of fun in a little house. Nick was smart and took the munchkins to the park to get them out of the house while the baby slept. The adults undertook the task of making the pirogi. We make them from scratch and it is a long process, but worth it I assure you. My mother also makes borscht. My kids really like pirogi and look forward to it every year. We opened gifts, lots and lots of gifts. The kids were beyond excited. Cassidy wrapped a gift for Chris with the help of my neighbor that took him FOREVER to open. They wrapped it with lots of paper, tape, and ribbon. (Chris has decided this year that he did not want ribbons on anything.) She got a kick out of making things difficult for him.
On the Saturday after Christmas, we hung out with my brother and his wife and kids and my sister and her husband. We explored Albanese Candy Factory. Never a good place to go when you are hungry. For those who do not know, they actually have a chocolate fountain. Candy, candy everywhere. My sister-in-law decided that we had to go get lunch right after we left there. :) We went bowling. I am not very good at bowling, but it sure can be fun when you are playing with family. We got two lanes, one for kids with the bumpers and a ramp for the little ones and one for the adults with the gutters wide open. :) The kids had lots of fun and my brother-in-law can really bowl. :) I think my favorite part of the day was dinner. We had chicken tacos with all sorts of veggies. (Avocado, cucumber, peppers, lettuce, carrots, tomatoes, fried mushrooms and onions, and cheese. Sounds good right.) My mother thought we were crazy to add cucumber and carrot, but my kids love it and so did my sis and bro-in-law. Once dinner was over, we played hand and foot. If you have never played, you are really missing out. My boys got to play for the first time and Christopher is a card shark. He and my mother were partners and they kicked butt. However my brother and his wife beat everyone. Everyone kept asking Barry which cards to pick. Apparently he really helped them all, but not so much himself. I think they both had a good time.
Over all we had a good holiday and so far a healthy one. :)
Monday, December 30, 2013
Thursday, December 5, 2013
Asthma Strikes Again!
Well, how was your Thanksgiving? Mine was great!! I had a great time with family and friends. I taught a new friend and a cousin how to make a fleece tie blanket, refreshed another cousin on the technique, made lots of fruit salad and desserts, and talked a lot. We had 35 people at my mother's house so it was a little full, but I sometimes think that is the best time. Everyone hung out and had fun.
Everyone knows that a lot of stores were opening on Thanksgiving evening and I said, "Nope, no way. I am NOT going to shop on Thanksgiving!" Well, little did I know, but my cousin decided that while she was in Indiana, she would take advantage of our lower sales tax. (For those interested, she lives in Chicago and Chicago has the highest sales tax in the country, so you can see why she would want to do this.) She has not know where ANYTHING is in Indiana. So guess what that meant? Yep, you guessed it. I went shopping on Thanksgiving! We had a good time. It gave us time to talk and catch up with each other's busy lives. We got home at almost 2:30 am. Talk about tired!! My daughter made it through Thanksgiving with no visit to the hospital! (Remember last year we spent Thanksgiving day in the PICU.)
Friday, all three kids went to visit their grandparents. They have been going over there every other weekend. I enjoy the break and they have been getting to know their grandparents better. I think it is a win win situation. On Saturday morning, I got a call asking if Cassidy could take some allergy meds. Sure why not? (Her nose was running.) I got another call that afternoon. She took some Tylenol for a headache. (No fever.) That is fine. I was totally not worried. I knew she had a new inhaler (194 puffs left) so she should be fine with her breathing, right? Apparently not. At 8:30 Cassidy called me and asked me to pick her up because the inhaler was not working. (For those of you with asthmatics you know that sometimes using the nebulizer works better because it allows the medicine to work over a slower period of time.) So I went and picked her up. I ended up with all three kids coming home, but that was fine. While I was in the car a found out that the inhaler only had 52 puffs left. WAIT JUST A MINUTE!!!! I know Chris also uses the inhaler, but he and Cassidy agreed that he only used the inhaler four times while they were there. (Each use is 2 puffs, even if he messed up and had to do three or four puffs each time, he only used it 16 puffs at most.) Let's do the math: 194-20 (benefit of the doubt, maybe he forgot a use or two.) = 174, 174-52= 122 puffs! I dropped the boys off at my mother's and headed to the ER.
Now most of you know that most ERs are always busy, but here we have a hidden gem. It is a new facility and still fairly unknown. Every time I have been there, we are taken straight into the triage room and then straight back. No different Saturday. We went straight back. Cassidy's pulse ox was 88. She was given 2 breathing treatments right a way and an oral steroid dose. Pulse ox stayed the same. Added oxygen, still the same. So she got admitted. The ER we go to is only and ER, not a full in patient hospital, so they transferred her by ambulance to our local hospital. I had the ER doctor call her asthma specialist and we were able to avoid an IV! Cassidy was VERY happy about that one.
She was in the hospital from Saturday night (the only kid on the peds unit) through Tuesday afternoon. She actually goes back to school in the morning. When will my child catch a break in this whole thing!
Everyone knows that a lot of stores were opening on Thanksgiving evening and I said, "Nope, no way. I am NOT going to shop on Thanksgiving!" Well, little did I know, but my cousin decided that while she was in Indiana, she would take advantage of our lower sales tax. (For those interested, she lives in Chicago and Chicago has the highest sales tax in the country, so you can see why she would want to do this.) She has not know where ANYTHING is in Indiana. So guess what that meant? Yep, you guessed it. I went shopping on Thanksgiving! We had a good time. It gave us time to talk and catch up with each other's busy lives. We got home at almost 2:30 am. Talk about tired!! My daughter made it through Thanksgiving with no visit to the hospital! (Remember last year we spent Thanksgiving day in the PICU.)
Friday, all three kids went to visit their grandparents. They have been going over there every other weekend. I enjoy the break and they have been getting to know their grandparents better. I think it is a win win situation. On Saturday morning, I got a call asking if Cassidy could take some allergy meds. Sure why not? (Her nose was running.) I got another call that afternoon. She took some Tylenol for a headache. (No fever.) That is fine. I was totally not worried. I knew she had a new inhaler (194 puffs left) so she should be fine with her breathing, right? Apparently not. At 8:30 Cassidy called me and asked me to pick her up because the inhaler was not working. (For those of you with asthmatics you know that sometimes using the nebulizer works better because it allows the medicine to work over a slower period of time.) So I went and picked her up. I ended up with all three kids coming home, but that was fine. While I was in the car a found out that the inhaler only had 52 puffs left. WAIT JUST A MINUTE!!!! I know Chris also uses the inhaler, but he and Cassidy agreed that he only used the inhaler four times while they were there. (Each use is 2 puffs, even if he messed up and had to do three or four puffs each time, he only used it 16 puffs at most.) Let's do the math: 194-20 (benefit of the doubt, maybe he forgot a use or two.) = 174, 174-52= 122 puffs! I dropped the boys off at my mother's and headed to the ER.
Now most of you know that most ERs are always busy, but here we have a hidden gem. It is a new facility and still fairly unknown. Every time I have been there, we are taken straight into the triage room and then straight back. No different Saturday. We went straight back. Cassidy's pulse ox was 88. She was given 2 breathing treatments right a way and an oral steroid dose. Pulse ox stayed the same. Added oxygen, still the same. So she got admitted. The ER we go to is only and ER, not a full in patient hospital, so they transferred her by ambulance to our local hospital. I had the ER doctor call her asthma specialist and we were able to avoid an IV! Cassidy was VERY happy about that one.
She was in the hospital from Saturday night (the only kid on the peds unit) through Tuesday afternoon. She actually goes back to school in the morning. When will my child catch a break in this whole thing!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)