Asthma Attack - Aah!!

One night in October on the Thursday night before General Conference, Simon woke around midnight having significant trouble breathing.  He couldn't talk so I gave him a dose from an inhaler we had from past incidents.  That didn't help too much but I had half a dose of steroids left from Piper's strep throat.  That helped him sleep for about two hours.  Around 4:30 I decided that he needed to go to the ER.  Rick stayed with Piper and got her off to school.  Even as I took Simon to the bathroom before we left, he was a sweetheart and told me that he loved me.  He can't breathe but he can say "I love you Mom."  Breaks my heart.

Simon was not doing well at all.  His oxygen saturation level was at 88 when most of the time it's at 98/99.  They gave him massive doses of steroids and a nebulizer.  He had to stay all day on Friday and even overnight since his oxygen levels kept dipping when he slept.  He had a chest x-ray, not his first by the way, just to exclude pneumonia.  He was feeling more like himself but they wouldn't release him yet.  His awesome pediatrician, Anita Sabeti, came to visit in the afternoon.  Rick brought some clothes and toys/books later and then came to relieve me around 5:00.  Rick stayed the night with him since I hadn't slept the night before.  Simon was not fond of the sticky oxygen monitor they made him wear on his toe.  We made it a bit more bearable by putting socks on his feet to cover it up.  I kept Piper busy on Saturday by having her help me decorate for Halloween.  They finally released Simon around 5:00 on Saturday night.  My mom and sister-in-law brought us dinner which was very nice.

So it would seem that Simon has asthma.  They don't like to diagnose kids under three with asthma because it could easily be a recurrent lung infection.  But since Simon is over three now and it's not the first bout he's had, they diagnosed him with asthma.  They gave us an inhaler and spacer for him to use.  Thankfully Simon's form of asthma is only triggered by sickness, not pollen, cold air, or exercise.  So when he gets a cold/cough, we have to be very vigilant and watch his breathing to avoid having to go to the hospital.  Things ended well but it was not an experience I want to repeat.