it has been a WEEK. maybe a month. i have no clue what day it is… i went 6 days without coffee and i don’t even know who i am anymore.
maybe a little dramatic, but, it’s safe to say, this has been one of my least favorite weeks in motherhood…there is absolutely nothing worse than watching your babies be sick, especially when you’re so sick yourself… and these eyes have cried a lot over the last week.

wednesday

last wednesday i took the girls to their ‘practice day’ of preschool.. it was so much fun, the girls had a blast and everyone had a great day!… i’ll be recapping their practice day + first days of preschool next week… i gotta get back in my groove!
after we got home from practice day, i put the kids down for naps {my mom had been watching mills} and my mom and i hung out for a bit while i cleaned up the house. everyone started getting up around 4 and as soon as mills got up, i heard ‘the cough’. if you’ve been around kids with croup, you know that cough and it ranks up there with the worst sounding coughs in the world…he opened up his mouth to talk and his voice was raspy + hoarse and i knew immediately he had croup. i called the pediatrician and told them he was a little labored breathing and had that cough and they wanted to get him in immediately…so 630 my mom and i are rushing the 3 kids to the doc. piper was a little hoarse but otherwise fine so we opted to only give mills the steroid shot. he was perfect as usual, cried for all of 10 seconds and then was his sweet little self wanting to snuggle. we went home, i fixed a quick dinner that no one ate and we all went to bed…

thursday

through the night, lila got up 3x throwing up from coughing and eventually slept with us until i could call the doc again… they got us in right away at 9, so i packed everyone back into the car to head in, going downhill myself as the morning hours were going by.
as i was buckling mills in, zach called..and it hit me… i, shockingly, made it out of the garage and the puking began. thank GOD zach was able to get a sub immediately and he met me at the doctor to help me handle the kids while lila got her round of steroids…she’s not the toughest little cookie  in the box and it was a leeeeetle more dramatic.
back home and puking all. over. the. place. thankfully zach was able to help take care of the kids while i rested/threw up all over and one by one, we were dropping like flies.

friday

i think it was thursday…but it may have been friday…at some point i spiked a fever and was basically on death’s doorstep. mills started throwing up somewhere in there and poor baby was puking every 10-15 minutes.

then it was piper’s turn. as soon as she started throwing up, i had zach take her to the doc immediately and also grab anti-nausea meds for everyone white he was there. i had showered 4x by this point and was instantly thrown up on again by someone else… we were a mess. i was crying. miller was going between being a rag doll and throwing fits. piper’s puking. lila’s puking. bless zach’s heart he’s trying to empty bowls, keep everyone on the couch… it was a mess.

saturday

i eventually fell asleep about 3pm friday and i don’t remember anything until 8am on saturday. i know zach + my mom had hospital plans… but. by morning i was kinda sorta feeling a little better… until i wasn’t. back to sleeping + puking.
by the afternoon the kids were all starting to feel better and were over sitting on the couch, so zach got them out of the house for a little bit after naps.
i was still rockin the anti-nausea meds but as the day went on, i was doing better and better.

 

sunday

sunday came and it was a NEW day!! i felt 100x better and thought we were all on the mend so we disinfected the ENTIRE house…mopped, cloroxed virtually everything, cleaned all bathrooms…the whole nine yards.

as the day went on though, lila seemed to be getting more and more hoarse {again}, more raspy, more tired, whiny and after naps she woke up wheezing and having to work to breathe while coughing up a storm. by 6pm she was begging to go to bed because she didn’t feel good and we put her down at 8 saying, ‘i have a bad feeling about tonight.’ she fell asleep and around 9 she woke up coughing, then crying and zach ran in to grab her and she could barely breathe. she was so scared and then panicked, making it worse and she eventually got to the point where she was barely able to take a breath at all and her lips turned dusky. i immediately made the 911 call to squad her and then called my mother-in-law all but begging her {she didn’t think twice, she’s always more than willing to help} to come stay with the kids so zach could meet me at the hospital. we’re so blessed to have them less than 5 miles from us {she’s come to my rescue many times!}. lila’s oxygen levels were in the low 90s when we got into the ambulance but as soon as we got her calmed down and with some oxygen, she was right back up to the upper 90’s, thank god.

our emergency responders are amazing people…we are seriously so thankful for these men + women + their families… and lila became very attached to the fire chief {who was the emergency responder for us that night}…she asked him to carry her into the hospital after he gave her a special blue bear.

we got right into a room and after hearing her from the hallway, the doctor ordered a breathing treatment + round of steroids stat… 2  hours later and zero improvement, they did another breathing treatment, waited another hour and when they said she was still 40% obstructed, they took an x-ray of her chest, which came back negative. they decided to admit her for monitoring…thank god. while i really was hoping she would get the treatment and we could go home, she sounded terrible and i was terrified she would cough, get upset again and we’d wind up back in an emergency situation.

SOMEWHERE in there, zach arrived to the hospital with my mom and bill {stepdad} and within 30 minutes, bless his heart, zach looked at us all and said he’d be back, he didn’t feel well…yep. poor daddy’s turn, and all i could do is laugh…. we instantly made him leave, only to realize i sent my ride home as well, but he for SURE needed to be home resting.

unfortunately the only downside to the ER we were at is that they didn’t have rooms, so we had to be transported, again, downtown to the main children’s hospital. by this time, sweet lila was a little hyped up from the steroids + breathing treatments and was SO excited to ride in the ambulance again so she asked me to snap this pic to show her ‘pep’ {piper}.
she fell right to sleep in the ambulance and we finally got settled about 330, thank god she slept through the whole thing and i finally closed my eyes for a couple hours.

monday

as she rested, her airways were able to relax a bit and by morning she was doing SO much better. she was no longer wheezing or really even breathing heavy so when the docs came by on rounds they said she was cleared for discharge! they were all SO great, so caring and loving and patient…we truly had such a great experience.

meanwhile, little miss ducky had her first day of preschool, thanks for family + friends… cheryl {who’s little girl also goes to the same preschool} picked piper up for me and also snapped some first day pics…oh my heart….and christine {my sister, who’s little boy also goes} packed her lunch for her}…it takes a village, y’all.
my mom was SO kind to grab mills for zach so he could stay in bed and took him back to her house…when it was time, she + mills came and picked us up from the hospital to take us home before going to pick piper up from school too.

the rest of the day was spent on the couch with movies, popsicles and snuggles.
the end to the week from hell and we are ALL back on the bend, back to school and ready to kick off the start of the school year!!