Pneumonia

So.....here's the update. Last Thursday, after a few days of Clara's cold and after some encouragement from her grandparents, I called our new pediatrician. She said we could come in that afternoon, so we headed over for a 4:45 appointment. It was our very first appointment with her and I really liked her. She apologized for sending us to the ER on our first meeting, but she suspected Clara had some bronchialitis and she wanted to check out her oxygen.
Making a couple phone calls on the way, Clara and I headed to the hospital. We were registered and triaged pretty quickly. Then we were sent into an ER room and taken for an x-ray. Clara did not care for the x-ray at all, as she had to be strapped to a board with her arms up against her ears. We didn't find out for several more hours, but the x-ray showed pneumonia in her right lung. After lots and lots of boring waiting in the room, interspersed with the occasional visit from a tech who would take her temp or a doctor who would tell us we were doing well, but that the pediatrician would be in later, but mostly just lots and lots of waiting and wondering what they were going to do with us.... after all that they eventually told me that they wanted to keep her overnight. Of course Pete or I had to be with her- and we wouldn't have allowed it to have been any other way. They finally checked us into a room around 10:30 PM. Someone brought me a turkey sandwich and Pete brought my toothbrush and cell phone charger. Pete's parents had come to our house after Henry fell asleep so that Pete could run over to the hospital, but he didn't stay all night.
Here's a look at our room. You can see the crib in the background. You can see the IV stand and the blue tube that Pete mentioned in the previous post. And you can see the rickety wooden rocking chair with the broken handle.
She was on an IV with antibiotics because they weren't sure if the pneumonia was viral or bacterial. Turns out she had RSV, but they still wanted to be cautious in regards to any possible bacterial problems. They didn't want me to nurse her that first night, because nursing is, as one doctor put it- the baby's main form of exercise, and they didn't want her to tire herself out. Her oxygen level was being monitored and it was pretty good, but her respiratory rate was very high and they were kind of concerned about that.
They brought me an industrial strength pump, so we stored up some milk and by yesterday afternoon I was able to nurse her again. We've been taking it slow though- because if she tosses all the milk back out if she takes in too much. She did lots of good sleeping and actually learned to like a pacifier while we were in the hospital, so that was actually kind of nice.
After two nights they finally let us come home around 5:00 tonight. We were thinking that we would have to stay at least one more night, and worried that they would keep us longer to watch her once they found out that it was RSV. But she's such a strong little girl, and was doing really well so they sent us packing- with training in how to properly suction out her nose with the bulb syringe and how to do the therapeutic tapping on her chest and back, plus a prescription for oral antibiotics and encouragement to get a humidifier (Pete was already on top of that).
Here's how she's looking now that we're home:
The hospital staff was really great- for the most part- except for the nurse who grunted at me last night. She made me feel a little bit sad and alone and just finished with the whole thing (yes, just with that one little grunt- I was a little sleep deprived). But I put Clara in the bed with me and we snuggled and talked about which nurses we liked best and then we both felt better. After about midnight she went back to her own crib and we both slept again until I was awakened by the smell of microwave popcorn at 3AM. After nursing/spitting up/changing/suctioning we both went back to sleep around 4:30 and I was sleeping soundly when the pediatrician woke me at 7:00. Anyway-now we're home. We've watched the Charlie Brown Valentine's Day Special (with that antennae Will and Sandy brought us) ane Henry- who is so used to only watching videos now, wanted to know why we couldn't watch it again. I was just glad to have watched something other than a makeover or home improvement show.
So now Henry's in bed (with his new humidifier) and I'm about to nurse Clara again and try to put her down for a good sleep. Wish us luck!