Total Flashback

I had to pick up inhalers from the pharmacy yesterday. Make that three trips to the pharmacy in drizzly, cold rain before the pharmacists got us what we needed. The first location had the inhalers but not the opti-chamber and mask. The second location had the opti-chamber and mask but looked at me like  I was crazy when I showed up saying that the first location had sent me there. Then we got home and one of the inhalers had a circular mouthpiece instead of the curved rectangular one and didn't fit into the opti-chamber. I called the first location, and the lady told me that I could come back in and exchange it.

If I could have, I would have paid someone one.million.dollars to go and make that exchange. Noah and I had already been at the doctor's office that morning and had been up most of the night before. Poor kid was coughing more than usual on Wednesday as we ran around picking up last minute Halloween decorations and items for the iLove Music fall festival basket for Abby's class. That night at bedtime, his cough got worse - like coughing so hard that he actually threw up...three different times between 9pm and 1am.

The steam didn't help. The humidifier didn't help. The allergy medicine didn't help. I finally brought him into my bed, propped myself up on pillows, and let him sleep upright laying against me. I felt so bad for him and was clueless as to what to do. I said a prayer that he would be able to sleep, and he finally did.

Being that this cough has been hanging on since the beginning of October, I called the doctor in the morning. It had turned into bronchitis - thanks to the first doctor who told me "you just need to give it some time". I requested a different doctor for this visit who told me that seasonal allergies could be at the root of the problem and that he needed to be tested to see how severe they are. (Daddy is coming to that appointment - definitely going to need some back-up.) She also mentioned the possibility of asthma- or an allergy induced asthma - or something like that.

 All I heard was "asthma" and my mind went to Michael, my youngest brother. He's eighteen now, but I can still vividly remember pressing my ear against his little four-year-old back to check if he was wheezing...giving him nebulizer treatments in the middle of the night when he and my sister would sleepover...making sure we always had his inhaler with us...

My eyes started to tear up as the doctor was talking. I couldn't keep my composure...stupid sleep deprivation. I looked away from Noah not wanting him to think that something was wrong. Like the doctor said, it doesn't mean he has asthma, but she wants him to try the inhalers, come back in next week, and then get tested.

Noah actually thought the whole inhaler idea was pretty cool, especially when I told him that Uncle Michael has one too.  Still, it felt like I'd gone back in time - shaking up the inhaler, pressing the canister, and taking deep breaths in and out with Noah like I had done with Michael at his same age.

The inhalers made all the difference in the world. He slept last night. He went back to school and to the fall festival today. He's asleep right now.

Still, I am praying that he won't need them forever...that it's not asthma...and that he won't completely freak out when we go for the allergy testing - not looking forward to that.