Croup
Late last night I woke up in darkness not sure why I was suddenly awake. Then I heard the sound again, a barking cough. I stumbled out of bed to check on Patches because I confusedly thought he might be the source. He was sleeping like an angel without even snoring. The cough came again, it was Gleek. I should have known because that barking cough is indicative of croup and Gleek seems particularly succeptable to it. The cough wasn’t bad yet, Gleek wasn’t even fully awake, but I knew from unpleasant experience that if I didn’t treat it right away we’d end up listening to gasping breaths and wondering if it was time to go to the emergency room.
By the time I’d hauled her out of her top bunk, Howard was in the room as well. He’d been downstairs in his office. He heard the first cough and thought it was the neighbors dog. (They aren’t kidding when they describe the croup cough as “barking”) The second cough had him realize that the sound was inside our house which meant one of the kids. That was when he heard my footsteps. It’s nice to know that my Mommy Radar is properly tuned to wake me up at the first croupy cough. We carried sleepy, coughy Gleek to our bathroom and gave her a treatment of nebulized albuterol. That nebulizer is one of the many things for which I am grateful this morning. Our insurance bought it for us because Link was mildly asthmatic at an age where he couldn’t use inhalers. It has saved us from hospital trips more times than I care to count. If I had it to do over, I would have spent $200 cash and bought one myself about 3 years earlier than we acquired it.
This particular croup attack was mild. By the third nebulized breath, Gleek was breathing easier. I didn’t have to haul her outside to let her breathe freezing air or run the shower to let her breathe steamy air. Best of all we didn’t have to take her to the hospital for more vigorous treatments. In only 5 minutes we were done with the treatment and she was tucked back into bed where she slept peacefully for the rest of the night. It would be fine with me if none of my kids ever suffered from croup again, but it is also really nice to be experienced enough to know exactly what to do.