In a Split Second

It was a nebulizer night. How is it, in what seemed like a blink of the eye, my son went from being o.k., to needing to take his inhaler, to using his nebulizer?

We had gone to Costco, and when we left, his little eyes started to get grey and his face a ghostly shade of white and he was deep breathing. One of his many early signs of asthma flare ups. He took his inhaler and we thought we could go on with our night. We made one more stop to Toys R Us. We were there for 5 minutes when Carson said he wanted to go home. A child, who wants to leave Toys R Us??? I knew he was not feeling well.

He took his inhaler again in the car. When we made it home he went and retrieved his favorite stuffed animal Mugsy (Mugsy is the asthma animal, he went to the hospital with Carson for the initial asthma flare up and seems to be in Carson's arms during nebulizer treatments.) and found his way to the couch. He said he felt yucky, that it was his lungs, and continued to deep breath. I went and prepared his nebulizer and he started his treatment.

After his nebulizer treatment he decided he did not feel any better and needed to call Papa (his maternal grandfather, who luckily happens to be a retired physician). Papa happily came over, listened to his lungs, talked with him about his symptoms, and Carson and his sister looked through all his doctor gear. About 20 minutes later Carson was off the couch and playing with his sister.

I am still trying to figure out both my kids asthma. Carson seems to have more acute symptoms and my daughter seems to have more very mild chronic symptoms. I am so ready to see the Pediatric Lung Specialist, but that is still a month away. I am excited though, that they are delivering a portable nebulizer to our house today. It is so little, and has an adapter for the car. This is just in time for our trip this weekend. As a mother of 2 asthmatics, I cannot imagine what would be more scary then one of my children having an asthma flare up and be driving between cities. Now I can plug the nebulizer in the car.