My poor baby has Croup

We knew it was going to happen...the inevitable first bout with illness. But that didn't make it any less awful when I picked up my raspy, coughing, wheezing baby from daycare Friday evening.
The child who seemed fine at noon was most certainly not at 6 p.m.

A frantic phone call to good friend and mommy expert Alia, and a few minutes later, I knew: Scott had croup. The horrid, barking cough that made him sound like a hungry seal was too distinctive to be anything else.

I tried to make Scott feel better with a steamy stint in the bathroom with shower running full-blast, with a warm bath, with a bottle. Nothing seemed to work. So I put him to bed, hoping he would get a little bit of sleep.

When Jim came home from work he was horrified at how terrible Scott sounded (the baby had woken up less than 90 minutes after we put him in the crib.) We discussed whether to bring him to urgent care and decided to ride out the night.

Jim rocked Scott back to sleep and took the first shift. I went to bed and got 2 or 3 hours of sleep before we switched off. Good thing too...Scott woke up around 2:30 and didn't sleep longer than 45 minutes at a time for the rest of the night.

He'd doze off in his swing, only to be awakened by that hacking, barking cough. Then he'd cry. So we'd go into the bathroom and sit in the steam and I'd rock him back to sleep. Eventually, I just decided it was easiest to stay in his room with him, so I spent the night on the floor, sleeping fitfully at the foot of his swing.

By 7:30, Jim and I were up and dressed. The pediatrician's office opened at 8 a.m. and we were determined to be the first ones there.

Holding Scott upright helps ease his cough; Daddy tries to make him comfortable while we wait to see the doctor.

At the pediatrician's office; waiting for the steroid shot.

We got to the doctor's office at 8:01 a.m. Jim says next time, we'll arrive at 7:55. We were the third ones there, and had to wait about 30 minutes to get in. But we were lucky; by 8:15 there were 15 kids in the waiting room, including another infant who had a similarly distinctive cough.

The on-call doctor - who was fantastic - diagnosed Scott with croup on sight and was very good at explaining what was wrong with our little Munchkin. Basically, Scott had come down with some kind of virus -- perhaps a cousin of the flu virus, maybe RSV. Instead of staying in his nose and head and causing the typical sneezy, runny, congested, earache type symptoms, it burrowed in his upper respiratory tract, where it caused his airways, including his larynx, to inflame and swell. The condition, called larynotracheosomethingorother is what is causing his difficulty breathing and wheezing.

Unfortunately, antibiotics won't work; because its a virus, we just have to ride it out. But they did give Scott a steroid shot and a prescription for a different kind of steroid, which will hopefully lessen the swelling and make him more comfortable.

Our little guy is a trooper - he's hanging in there. But the pediatrician said to expect another long couple of nights, complete with steam showers, and humidifiers and raspy coughing. Jim's set up an air mattress in the baby's room, so the "on-call" person doesn't have to sleep on the floor. We also have to leave Scott out of daycare for the early part of next week until he stops sneezing and coughing and spreading germs around. Hoping he gets over this very, very soon. In the meantime, he's getting lots of hugs and kisses and cuddles from mommy.

The air mattress we've got in Scott's room, since he's waking up so frequently.

Putting on a brave face, post doctor, and showing off where we got the shot.