This week, no stickers were stuck to anyone's butt.
April 19, 2010
Today, for the first time ever, I got called to school to pick up Max because of an asthma attack. Usually all he needs to deal with his asthma is his rescue inhaler, but today it just wasn't cutting it. He sat there, wheezing and coughing, while the school administrator stood behind him and mouthed to me, "Take him to the doctor. NOW."
She used to be a ER nurse. It's not what I wanted to hear from her.
So of course, I trundled him directly to the doctor, where we waited for one zillion minutes for all the things to happen that needed to happen to get him to what he really needed, a breathing treatment. While he sat and wheezed in the misty air that relaxed his lungs, he texted my mom, "Hi, Amma. It's Max. One minute I'm at school, the next I'm in the doctor's office, with an oxygen mask on."
Sorry, Mom. And here you thought my days of giving you heart attacks were over, eh?
While Max breathed and slowly unknotted and stopped coughing, I wrestled with Sophia. Just a thought: wouldn't you expect a pediatrician's office to be baby-proofed? I mean, you're GOING to have toddlers in there, am I right? So why, exactly, would you put the computer tower, with its happy glowy power button, UNDER the desk, right at maniacally busy eye level? Why? Is it a little joke? And hello, *I* have latches on doors that shouldn't be opened by small hands. I knew allll about that, see, because YOU PEOPLE gave me a handout on the importance of baby-proofing. HAVE YOU READ YOUR HANDOUT?
Nonetheless, once Max was done with the treatment, he resumed a normal sort of breathing. We were sent on our way with a shrug for an explanation. I argued with the doctor for a few minutes, irrationally wanting him to TELL me what HAPPENED, or at least to admit that he didn't know.
I don't know what gets into me sometimes.
At least I gave up on that quickly enough and I took my easy-breathing-boy and my fiercely-busy-girl, and I went home.
I don't know what happened today, to make Max's lungs so tight. I don't know how much danger he was actually in (Mama circuits are overloaded quickly by the warning BABY CAN'T BREATHE. It makes it hard to process rationally, yaknow?), or how likely he is to have similar problems in the future.
I just know that I'm grateful for medicine that works, and I'm praying he won't ever need it again.
Long time asthmatic delurking here. Honestly, sometimes it does just happen. Which is to say, probably there was some mild inflammation going on for a while, and then he hit a trigger, and whoops, there it went. Spring is the most likely culprit.
His school isn't set up to give him a nebulizer treatment there? I can remember my high school was set up for that, but then they turned a blind eye to my (legal) narcotics that I carried on my person, so maybe they were just laid back.
As for danger, as long as you can still hear him wheezing, that's a good sign. I know it sounds weird, but the time to get really worried is when he suddenly stops wheezing, because that means he's too tight to make the wheeze sound.
From what you wrote, it sounds like he had one nebulizer treatment and then he was back to breathing. That's a really good reaction to treatment. Nebs typically get deeper in the lungs than an inhaler, and so this time he needed that extra help.
The bad news is, all asthmatics, however mild, have the potential for a bad attack. Most never do, though. The best thing to do is prevent them, while balancing that with not overmedicating. The general rule of thumb is that if he's needing to use his rescue inhaler twice a week or more, it's time to step up the medication. Many need to do that seasonally, including myself, from spring to early fall.
Posted by: Becca | April 20, 2010 at 01:34 AM
I would definitely look into possibly setting up a neb treatment at Monday school should he ever need it again. My nephew was on them as a youngster and had it at school. Currently my sister, mom and I all three use a machine. It can be scary, but I'm sure he'll be fine. Like Becca said, spring is prob the main contributing factor.
Posted by: Mary Jo | April 20, 2010 at 03:47 AM
The non-baby-proofed doctor's offices drive me crazy too! The ENT is the worst with all the fancy (read: God awful expensive) equipment scattered all willy-nilly about the room.
Posted by: Crisanne | April 20, 2010 at 07:00 AM
Wait, Max knows how to text? I am glad he is feeling better. I imagine you put on your calm, brave mama face that belied your panicky insides. Hope you can breathe easier now too. And if anyone could administer a nebulizer treatment, it's Jen.
Posted by: Groovecatmom | April 20, 2010 at 08:20 AM
How scary -- I'm so glad he's okay now! I don't know anything about asthma, but I think the advice of talking to the school about getting a nebulizer set up makes sense. Why not have that option? I would think that would help both you AND Max breathe easier. Not to mention poor Amma :)
Posted by: Aimee | April 20, 2010 at 09:27 AM
I am SO with you on the lack of babyproofing. Our pediatrician is a childhood friend of mine, and when mine were toddlers I outright RANTED to him about how much I hated having to come into the office because my kids would get completely frantic trying to get into everything that was locked away from them at home. It was completely exhausting for me, and considering one of them had recurrent ear infections, we were in there a LOT for a while.
Ugh.
Don't know if they've fixed it -- my guess is that they haven't -- but my girls did finally grow out of it. But my hair still hasn't grown back.
Posted by: Elaine P | April 20, 2010 at 11:03 AM
My little (8) guy has allergy induced asthma. This year has had record high pollen counts & he has broken through his preventative meds a couple times. His school has no problem with him getting nebbed when needed, or with keeping him (and the others just like him) inside when the counts hit insane levels.
Posted by: pharmgirl | April 21, 2010 at 07:05 PM
Is he on a "preventative" inhaler, one that is taken once or twice daily at the same time each day? My husband, who considered himself mildly asthmatic, only used a rescue inhaler as needed until he had a life-threatening asthma attack at age 25. Now he uses a daily preventative inhaler, keeps a rescue inhaler around (but rarely needs it), and also carries an epi pen because he's on allergy shots. The preventative inhaler helps, but for him, it's really the allergy treatment that has helped prevent major asthma attacks. He hasn't had any bad ones since about 6 months into the allergy shot program he's on.
Posted by: kate c.w. | April 21, 2010 at 09:46 PM
That happens to Michael some times, too...
Usually it's just a perfect storm of someone was doing some dusting and the weather was perfect but windy and he was running and playing and rolling in grass and EVERYTHING works to making his asthma worse...
Posted by: Heather Cook | April 28, 2010 at 12:41 PM