More About Linc

I do have other children, I swear.  But it seems like most of my blogs are about sweet, sweet Linc.  He really is that sweet though and this is another post dedicated to my first born, the apple of my eye.

As some of you have heard Lincoln has been SO SICK.  For 8 days, he has had a high fever, sore throat, cough, severe body aches, and has generally felt like complete and utter garbage.  As he put it, he said "I am so sick, I feel like I might die..."  Ohhh... my poor buddy!

So I have been the ever diligent mom.  Stopping what I was doing to give him a cuddle if he needed it, popsicles if he wanted, medicine, back rubs - pretty much anything that turned his fancy he got.  He would say so often, "Mom, thank you for being so good to me while I have been sick.  I promise, when I feel better, I will make you breakfast in bed."

Man that kid - you see why I melt a little.

Back to Linc.  So he has had a cough since last Wed. (and yes, I am certain he has H1N1 and no, he has not officially been tested), but since Sunday it has become a more persistant cough.  And he had complained a couple times that it was hard for him to breathe, and his heart rate and breathing was up.  Not thinking too much of it, I tried my best to make him comfortable.  It continued, and finally Wed. night I thought I would finally take him into the walk-in clinic.  He didn't want to be there after waiting for 1 hour, and told me again that it was hard to breathe, and that all he wanted to do was go home and go to sleep.  He was even crying!  I felt so bad for him, that I went to tell the desk clerk that was having a hard time breathing and this moved him up the line.  After 20 more minutes of agonizing wait, we finally got in to see the Doctor.  He listened to his chest, and sent him immediately over for a chest x-ray.    When we got back about 10 minutes later, he ran in from seeing the x-ray with an oxygen tank and pulse -oxygen meter.  He measured Lincoln and he was at an 84 which apparently is NOT good.  He phoned an ambulance, and told us that Lincoln needed to be at the ER where he could be properly helped.  I was in SHOCK.  Lincoln just had a cough!  Ok, he did have H1N1, but this guy was saying that he now had pneumonia, that part of his lung collapsed and that he had seen kids with higher levels of O2 crash, respiratory distress...

CRASH???  RESPIRATORY DISTRESS???  WHAT????

So - off we go in the ambulance.  Wheeled out of the clinic on a stretcher.  With masks on.  It was so surreal, I could hardly even register that it was that serious, let alone real. Although when they took his pulse-oxygen in the ambulance it was in the 70's - so it helped re-focus me as to what was really going on.  I tried not to think about that line from About a Boy that "while it was really serious to be driving behind an ambulance, driving that fast was fantastic..."  It was serious and scary and this was LINCOLN!  (But it was my first time in an ambulance, and maybe that part was a little cool. - )

After about 4 hours in the pediatric ER, and once his fever was controlled, his oxygen levels stabilized to 92 - enough to go home for the night.  We are on high alert though - if his conditions worsens at all, if he is not getting better in 48 hours, if he throws up his antibiotics we are to come back immediately.  He does have a secondary infection from ILI (influenza-like-illness officially) - pneumonia and part of his lung had collapsed.  Poor, poor, sweet Lincoln!  I felt terrible that I hadn't taken him in earlier.  That I had blown off his telling me "that it was hard to breathe" as just part of this flu.  When we got home, I held him and told him I was so sorry.  And promised not to blow it again.  (Not till next time anyway...)  This is my sweet boy, and it is crazy to realize how serious it was.  The walk-in doctor phoned today, asking how he was feeling and re-hashed the previous evenings events with me.  Today, he was even more upfront about how scared he was for Lincoln.  It had really, really scared him.  When I think about how Lincoln had been so tired in the waiting room, and that he had been begging to go home to go to bed, crying that he was so sick... it makes me sick to think about the possibilities.  And beyond grateful that I finally took him into the clinic when I did, and for doctors, and diagnostic equipment, and for vaccines so others won't have to go through this...

So it was pretty crazy and very scary.  But I hope now that he will get better quickly.  He is on some crazy antibiotics that make him gag, but hopefully he is on the mend.  Thanks to all of you who have called and for dinners.  We didn't need them, but it is so nice to be thought of.  Thank you, thank you, thank you.