Cooper's Health: Croup

Today, I am writing about Croup. Cooper's first real big encounter with a scary bug. Why am I writing about Cooper catching a bug? Every kid catches bugs. Well, I’ve seen firsthand how kiddos with Down syndrome can really suffer from sickness. Down syndrome means smaller stature which means smaller airways which means any sort of respiratory germs can really affect their bodies in a major way. Down syndrome also means low muscle tone which means that using muscles to cough to help get rid of said germs can be harder. In short, germs can be scary for small children with Down syndrome.

My husband and I had an awesome opportunity to travel to Costa Rica a couple weeks after Cooper's first birthday with some friends. My mom, my sister, and my aunt volunteered to take our kids while we were away. I'm sure they made my kids feel so much love, and I'm grateful for them taking on extra work. We landed back in USA late on a Tuesday night, 90 ninety minutes away from our babies. My mom called me when we landed to let me know that Cooper had a fever. Big sister was also not feeling super great. She also said Cooper laughed for the first time. Bad and good things.

We slept at a hotel for a few hours and left to go pick up our babies first thing in the morning. When we walked in the door, Cooper was in a bad way. The sickness had turned worse, and he was inconsolable and struggling to breathe. We debated taking him to the hospital right away, but my mom lives three hours from our home. If he was going to be hospitalized, we wanted to be closer to home. We loaded up and James drove so fast that our three and half hour drive was slimmed down to just three hours (safely, I might add). “We are not stopping to pee even once,” I told our bid kid sternly, “so don’t even ask.”

The whole way I sat by Cooper and watched his breathing. He mostly slept, thankfully, but antyime he opened his eyes, he cried. He was miserable and I was beside myself with worry. I got online to my DS parent groups and searched. Croup, fever, trouble breathing. What can I do to help support him?

After arriving at the doctor's office, the pediatrician took one look at him and said, "It's croup." He said his lungs sounded good. His ears looked fine. They gave him a shot of steroid, then used a nebulizer immediately after to diffuse some more steroid more into his body. We were told the steriod would help open up the airways that were constricted and causing the wheezing sound that Croup is known for. We had to wait an hour at the doctor's office to be cleared to go home, just to make sure there were no adverse reactions to the steroids. Our big kid was glad when they asked her if she wanted to watch a show while we waited.

After an hour, Cooper's wheezing wasn't gone, but it was much better. The doctor said we could go home and gave us his personal cell number to be reached in case things got worse. That's when I knew it must be kind of serious, when I got a personal phone number from the doctor. We went home and I started supplements and humidifying for all us. We spent a lot of time in a steamy bathroom to help open airways. We also took Coop bundled up outside in the cold air because we were told that would help. The wheezing went away and his breathing seemed better pretty quickly, but then a nasty congestion set in. Every day, several times a day, we would go into the steamy shower room and let his nose start running, then suction him with the Nozebot machine I had ordered just about a month before this illness hit. It's hospital grade suction, so I knew it was doing a good job. We started to see smiles again. Cooper started eating again. We were getting our happy boy back.

I’ve waited a few weeks to write this, to be sure we were out of the woods and I could report fully on how it went. It’s interesting how much more on high alert I am if Cooper seems the least bit sick. But I’m thankful he’s my second child. There are some differences to his care than to his sister’s, but for the most part it’s the same, so I can rest a little easier feeling like I know at least a little bit what I'm doing. The other thing that reassured me was the little Owlet oxygen monitor. I know this device can be controversial, but it helped me see where Cooper’s o2 levels were at and feel confident that he was going to be okay.

About a week after the official croup diagnosis, about the same time that Cooper was starting to get better, I started getting sick. I never (rarely) get sick. It felt like an insult that my body would allow itself to get sick in the middle of one of the most stressful times of my life. But it also made sense. Don’t they say that stress can really do a number on the immune system? No wonder my body fell victim to the germs present in our house. I have spent the last two months trying to recover from whatever illness I had. Mostly just an annoying throat tickle cough and subsequent hoarse voice. I have finally turned the corner into better health as well.

Sickness is an inevitable part of life, I know that. But I fret at the sound of a cough or the sight of a runny nose. Maybe one day I won’t be like this, or maybe I still will be. At any rate, I’m glad our boy's very first run in with a bug wasn’t too scary, and I do NOT look forward to the next one.

I send all the prayers, positive vibes, good karma or whatever you believe in to every mother everywhere caring for sick children. It is so freaking hard. Because when you love someone so fiercely, the very last thing you want is to see them suffer in any way.

Absolute misery driving home.

Nebulizer steroid treatment at doctor’s office. Thank goodness for modern medicine when we need it!