Friday, October 19, 2007
Here we go again ....
Here we are, yet again, in the middle of an "asthma" attack for Parker. He doesn't fit any of the molds, as he only ever gets attacks when sick, so it is rather intermittent. However, the only intermittent that is recognized is "mild", and Parker's "attacks" aren't mild. :( He was sick for a few days and then, WHAM!!! In the course of 3 hours, he goes from normal to wheezing and about to vomit (all due to an increase in coughing).
So, we'd been doing albuterol breathing treatments since he got sick 2-3 days ago, every 4 hours, to see if we could stave off this part of it. All looked great! He even got through his normal "feel very nauseous/no eat" day, which normally coincides with an attack. That was yesterday. Started eating again last night, and ate today. Treatments at 8 am, 12pm, 4pm, then he starts running around and playing, and I try to get him to be a little more sedate in his play (poor guy!!). He does a little, but is still coughing.
A little coughing leads to a little more coughing (these are non-productive coughs), and at 7 pm, I give him his next treatment a little early, just to get him to stop coughing!! It worked, temporarily, and he's tired, so I coerce :rolleyes him to take some Motrin (to lower his temp, which was elevated a little from the coughing, and can exacerbate the inflammation process, supposedly), and at 8 pm Jeff gets home and we decide to give him a cough suppressant for the first time ever (it says it won't work at all on asthma coughs, so we figure no harm, no foul).
I gave him another breathing treatment at 9:30, because of wheezing in his sleep, and it immediately got better. But, now we are here at 11pm, and it seems to be getting worse again. WHAT GIVES!!! And, of course it is a Friday night, which means the ER if this progresses.
This just totally sucks, and I want to cry and have it magically made better, but I can't, and he's miserable, and there is nothing to do!! Our pediatrician doesn't recommend daily meds (and we agree with that), as he doesn't have constant asthma at any level, and yet when these attacks come, they scare me to death. I'm tired, but I can't sleep!!
------------------------------------------------