Surviving 2011 . . .

Hi-Dee-Oh, TLN'ers!!

2011 has blown a wild and crazy path through my life. I thought I'd gotten all the hatches buckled down and things were smoothing out . . . boy, was I wrong!

Four weeks ago, my older kids came down with a cold. Any other time I wouldn't worry, but this go'round I had the baby to worry about. Despite all my best efforts to keep the bigger kids cold away from the baby, she managed to contract the virus.

As it turns out, a cold in an infant is RSV. She was almost instantly conjested and her breathing was labored (what I now know as 'retracting'.) The day after (1/31) she was diagnosed with RSV, we were headed to the children's hospital an hour away. We sat in the ER for 20 hours before they could find a bed for her. After three days of monitoring, breathing treatments, and nose sucking, we were released on Friday, 2/4. She was supposedly "on the mend".

NOPE! Our first day home, she got a slight fever and kept one all the way till Sunday night. She also developed a rather nasty cough. I had an appointment for the doctor Monday morning, so I knew I just had to get through the next day. Well, Monday 2/7 at 3am she got into such a coughing fit that she turned magenta and just froze up!!

Terrified the HELL out of me.

At the doctor's, he heard her cough once and said she needed to be back in the hospital ASAP. This time he made arrangements for us to go to the Pediatric Ward of the hospital only 25-30mins away. I left his office and went home to pack things up. Hubs and I were back in the ER again only this time they had a room on the pediatrics floor saved for us. A chest xray informed us she had pnuemonia and what the docs thought to be Whooping Cough- not to mention pink eye! My four week old baby had caught a secondary infection presumably from the ER at the Children's Hospital the week before. (I had caught the pink eye, too!)

We spent 8 days in the hospital. She had to be put on oxygen as she wasn't recovering her O2 during the coughing spells or even just normal breathing. We had tons of spells where she turned magenta. Very scary. BUT she is home now, released 2/14 and doing great!

I should be getting my older kids back tonight. They have weathered the craziness beautifully thanks to my hubby's wonderful family. My folks helped hubs and I by providing snacks and laundry service. We definitely couldn't have done this without our families.

So, bear with me. I have authors lined up and will be getting back into the swing of things starting this week. Thanks to everyone for your love and support. :)