Lucia developed a fever Friday night and started getting progressively worse over the weekend. Yesterday we started breathing treatments, but loaded her in the new stroller with blankies and took her on a walk over to Piedmont Avenue, which has lots of stores and restaurants. On the way home she absolutely refused to ride in the stroller, so we alternated between carrying her and letting her walk. My favorite part was when we got to walk through the municipal rose garden, which is very close to our new place. It's so beautiful, and Lucia enjoyed it too.
It was a nice respite from the worrisome morning and what turned out to be an upsetting night.
Unfortunately she took a turn for the worse when we got home; her fever spiked to 102 and she seemed out of breath despite having albuterol. After calling the advice nurse, she told us to take her to the ER. We got there, and they took her stats, and her pulse ox -- the level of oxygen in her blood -- was a little low, so they were concerned. We waited a bit longer, then saw a doctor who prescribed prednisone, the same necessary evil drug I've had to go on several times this year, and they gave her a breathing treatment. She was absolutely wired when we got home (around 9), but we managed to get her to eat some dinner and go to bed easily. Well, somewhat, if you count banging on the door and crying. Which is basically every night since we decided to take away the pacifier. But I digress...
The doctors aren't sure if she has asthma or what, but she has asthma-like symptoms whenever she gets sick. So we'll be using the nebulizer to give her breathing treatments until the end of May (and the end of flu season!). It is also likely that the dairy challenges we tried leading up to the weekend did not help, so we won't be doing that again until we have the green light from her allergist.
We know it's just asthma-like, and I'm trying really hard not to jump to conclusions and stay calm. As for Lucia, she's absolutely fine. She was jumping on the beds in the ER during last night's visit -- despite not being able to breathe -- and seemed generally unfazed by the whole thing. Though she did break down at dinner and sobbed her eyes out. I sympathized. Going to the hospital is STRESSFUL.
