Trying to get to New York

Spencer woke up monday morning the day before we were to leave to New York struggling to breath and coughing up a storm. He has been diagnosed with reactive airway disease so it wasn't anything new to us and I new what to do.  I  put him on the nebulizer and gave him some allergy medicine like normal and expected everything to clear up.  I waited and still he coughed as his lips started turning a little blue.

I made him the first appointment available with Dr. Lampron and was told that he should have been taken to the emergency room that morning and that his oxygen levels were too low for him to leave the office. Luckily she was able to give him two rounds of steroids and a breathing treatment to get his oxygen level back up to normal. Phew.

We left the office with 6 prescriptions to keep his airways open, an antibiotic and orders to cancel the trip if his breathing did not improve by the next morning on the medication. Fortunately, he did well on the medicine and we were able to go on our trip as planned. Life has a way of not going as planned. I'm just glad he was able to get better...or so we thought.

The first night in New York after our flight arrived and we were settled in at our hotel he started in with his cough and fever combo again. An hour or so after we gave him some ibuprofen we realized his fever was not going anywhere in fact it seemed to be getting worse. Into the ice bath he went. I know it sounds like a really cruel thing to do but he really Loved with a capitol L all the attention he got during the bath and it did help his fever go away. I made him a "party drink" to cool him down from the inside a little. It was basically kool-aid on ice.  In addition to the party drink we got bucket after bucket of ice to play basketball with in the tub. He would try and make a basket into a plastic cup. The steroid and nebulizer seemed to make him hyper as well. It was very entertaining...until 11 or 12 rolled around that is and then we were just ready for bed.

He took the first opportunity he got to brag exitedly to Grant about his middle of the night games in the tub and party drink. We are lucky he is so darn pleasant when he's not feeling well.

We gave him the nebulizer and inhaler or "Healer" as he liked to call it ever four hours during his waking hours for nearly the entire trip. In addition to that his fever stayed constant and required ibuprofen and tylenol every 4-6 hours to keep it away. Two of the nights we had to give him an ice bath since the ibruprofen wasn't doing the job--he is an old pro at all of this and I am seriously so impressed with his attitude.

Oh and he had to get a nose bleed too in the middle of the bath to make it a little more fun. :)

I was very concerned for a while that he would miss out on this big New York trip we have been planning and looking forward to for so long. I am grateful for prayer and feel that he was able to enjoy the trip because our prayers were answerred.