We have experienced a lot in our first eight months of parenthood. We’ve been blessed with a happy and healthy child. Cam is not only off the charts for height and in the mid 90s for weight, he’s actually never really been sick. Sure he’s had a couple of runny noses, and maybe an upset tummy, but nothing that required a visit to an ER or the pediatrician. Until now.

On the day he turned eight months old we got our first helping of what its like to have a sick kid at home. It unfolded exactly like I always assumed it would. I am home with him all day and noticed NOTHING unusual. He was acting fine, happy, smiling, eating etc. Sara gets home and within 90 seconds discovers that he has a fever and that we should probably call the doctor. Going up against mother’s intuition, when that mother is also a doctor, is pretty unfair. In any case his fever was 103.5. A pretty bad miss on my part, but I will stress that fevers tend to get worse at night and she gets home at like 5! We treat with tylenol to get through the night and I call the pediatrician to get a sick visit on the books. Our first.

Cam is pretty good in the doctor’s office. He hates the shots and even the exams, but he LOVES sitting on the exam table and tearing the tissue paper that covers it apart. It doesn’t take too long for our doctor to discover the problem, an ear infection. In both ears. Yuk. Amoxicillin is prescribed and we are on our way. The doctor gives me kudos for noticing this and deciding to come in. I consider taking those kudos, but give Sara the credit this time.

He never really does “act” sick. He sleeps well most of the time and that continues. The only real difference is trying to work the medicine into our eating routine. He gets wise to the big syringe filled with pink medicine, so we resort to sneaking it into his spoon of food. It worked.

So that was that, until it wasn’t. He was pretty much full strength by the end of the amoxicillian. His fevers were a thing of the past and we were pretty relieved that we all survived his first illness. That lasted about 48 hours.

Last Tuesday night around 10pm he woke up crying, vomiting and what at first seemed like trouble breathing. He was hysterical and his parents were beginning to feel the same way. I always look to Sara for guidance when anyone is sick or injured. She has all the training afterall. When she looks back at me with a “I don’t what to do” look, we get in the car and go to the ER.

It should be noted that the weekend before we spent the night with my sister who now lives on the Eastern Shore of Maryland. She has four kids, all of whom are either in the public school system or in daycare. If someone in your group doesn’t get sick after 24 hours with them, you just aren’t trying. I won’t blame this one on them, this time!

On the way to the ER everyone relaxes a little bit. Cam calms down and it becomes clearer to Sara what is going on. Croup. He wasn’t having trouble breathing so much as he was alternating between breathing and awful seal like coughs. The ER visit was remarkably quick. We got seen almost immediately and Croup was confirmed by the Peds ER doctor. They gave him an oral steroid and we were sent home. The “good” news with croup is that the treatment is pretty much limited to the oral steroid. No additional medicine required. The bad news? The steroid wears off in a couple of days and you have to hope that he’s over it by day three.

Here we are a week later and we have yet another sick visit scheduled for 4pm today. We’re pretty sure the croup is gone but an ugly cough and super runny nose remain. I think whatever this one is can be blamed on one of my nieces or nephews!