Nebulizer

As of last night we are the proud owners of a nebulizer. Let me back up a little bit. Sunday night at the lake Cooper had a barking cough so instantly I thought "Crap! He has Croup again". By Monday night the barking cough wasn't there but his nose had become a faucet. He was also coughing quite a bit and we could tell he just wasn't feeling well. Yesterday when I picked him up from daycare I heard that he was wheezing and almost immediately I traveled back in time 10 years to when my god son Aries was diagnosed with asthma triggered by cat and dog allergies. I can't imagine what I would do if I had to find new homes for all the animals. So I packed his Elmo backpack and we headed to ready care. The doctor heard his wheezing and thought we should try a neb treatment to see if that would help. The nurse that came in with the machine turned it on and stuck it on Cooper's face. The poor little guy was so scared! I had to hold his arms and wrap my leg around his legs because he was kicking the crap out of me. Then he started thrashing his head so I had to use my head to hold him down. The nurse finally came back in to check on us, probably because she could hear his screams in the entire building. She tried giving Cooper a toy frog which he immediately threw across the room. I tried everything, even giving him my cell phone, to calm him down with no luck. Sigh. It was awful, probably the worst 8 minutes Cooper and I have spent together so far. The doctor gave me the good news, it was only a virus. Then came the bad, we would have to continue the neb treatments every four hours while he was awake for the next 7-10 days.

After what I went through last night I figured it would be easiest if there were two of us to hold him down this morning. Or to at least to give my bruises a break. Thankfully he did much better this morning. I am sure it helped that we showed him the mask, let him play with it, eased him into it and didn't strap the mask to his face - I just held it in place. Of course putting on an Elmo DVD didn't hurt anything either. Wish me luck for the next 7-10 days.