Thankful

I am not one to run to the Dr if my kids have a cold or sore throat or the flu. I guess it's because growing up in Del Bonita, being 30 mins from a Hospital, my mom just dealt with sick kids with what she had at home. (Broken bones were a different story, 30 mins was about 15 when those occurred.) I can' t remember when the last time I took my kids or me to the Dr's, probably a year and a half ago. However Monday morning Nevee woke up with a horrible raspy voice and breathing. I gave her one of those strips that melt on your tongue, for sore throat, cough and runny nose. By 12:30pm I gave her an children's Advil because she cried that her head hurt and she felt like she had a fever. I really wasn't alarmed or anything, especially when at 4:30 Pacey and Laina wanted to go outside to play. Nevee insisted she go to, so I made sure her hood was over her ears and sent her out. She played for an hour and was feeling much better. I knew she was sick as she didn't eat much or drink much (not even a Slurpee!) and had 3 45 min naps through out the day and still went to be at 8pm. By 10pm I called to talk with Kirk and Nevee woke up crying and sounding like she had that morning but a little worse. She was HOT and it seemed like she couldn't breath and I immediately thought "could she have asthma?" Kirk heard how bad she sounded and told me to call his mom to come over so I could take Nevee up to Emerg. I hummed and haud a little because I didn't want to waste any ones time and didn't think there was anything they really could do. But I called Debi, she was over in 5 mins and I took Nev to the Hospital. The Nurse listened to her breathing asked if she had asthma, I said "no", and took her temperature, 39.6 C. Yikes. The X-Ray tech was called in and the Dr came in just after. X-rays were take of Nevee's chest to see if there was any fluid in her lungs. Dr. Greg Smith came in and as soon as he herd her cough he said "Oh I wish my intern was here, that is the classic cough for croup. We should record it, it's so textbook." lol. He listened to her lungs and checked the x-rays, no fluid in her lungs. Good! He explained about croup that it is essentially her vocal cords swelling from a virus and the raspy sound is just the air trying to get in and out. Kind of like if you were whistling. He prescribed one dose of something, called Dex.... something, that would take care of the worst of it and if she couldn't breathe well again to take outside for 10 mins or so. I guess cold air shrinks the vocal cords when it comes to croup. No wonder why she felt better that afternoon when she went out to play. My Poor baby! So I tilted this post Thankful, there are so many reasons why:
1. To live in this prosperous country, province and town.
2. I didn't have to pay for a ER visit.
3. Didn't have to pay for the meds.
4. No x-ray fee.
5. Only waited 5 mins to see the nurse and then 25 mins to see the x-ray tech and another 15 minutes to see the Dr. I was in and out of there in 50 minutes.
6. Diagnosis wasn't asthma or worse.
7. Technology and medical research
8. My mother in law
9. Kirk for pushing me to go.
10. Nurse Lisa, x-ray Margaret and Dr. Smith they were wonderful!