croup again???

Holy smokes! James has croup again! He was fine all day Thursday and then just as I was getting into bed (about 11:00pm) I heard him coughing and choking and crying. I ran into his room to check on him and he was having trouble breathing and coughing that horrible barking cough. I recognized it for what it was and took him to the bathroom and turned on a hot shower hoping for the steam to help. It didn't. In fact, James got worse and had his mouth open (drooling like nobody's business) and every time he had that horrible strider sound when he breathed in. I woke up John, asked his opinion and then wrapped James in his blanket and took him to the ER.

Thank goodness the hospital is only five minutes away! The woman at the reception desk took a look at my face and heard James struggling to breathe and sent us right back to see a nurse. They asked me a few questions and then got James settled in a bed with a breathing treatment. James was exhausted and scared and would not let me put him down. I didn't want to let him go either so we sat on the hospital bed for a while as the breathing treatment helped him a little and we waited to see the doctor. The resident came in and figured out pretty quick that we had been through this before and that this was bad. She gave him a nebulizer treatment and suggested we get chest x-rays to make sure it wasn't pneumonia. The neb helped (when he finally got it at 1:00 am) and for the first time James perked up a little bit and started talking. I finally started breathing, myself.

By the time the tech came to take us for x-rays, James was downright chatty. He held still for the x-rays and when the tech put them up on the lighted board to check them out, James said, "It's General Grievious!" I started cracking up. Thanks heavens the lab tech was a Star Wars fan!