Can I get a Whoop, Whoop??

Two nights of no sleep due to a sick, uncontrollably coughing three year old being present in our bed led me to take Carson back to the pediatrician to see what else they could do for my poor baby. The cold that took hold and required steroids and endless Albuterol treatments seemed to be getting better last Friday in Tennessee. Tissues filled with snot were no longer carpeting our house and the boys were back to their usual fighting and playing. Then Carson started increasing his coughing again on Saturday night/Sunday morning. By Monday morning Carson was barking like a dog in spurts. Monday night was terrible and we thought Carson was heading down to Children's Hospital for another fun visit again. He spent the entire night plastered against me in bed violently coughing for 4 hours straight, right in my face. Ahhh, the things we put up with to comfort our children.

By 5:30am Tuesday morning Carson fell fast asleep and stopped coughing. No fever, no runny nose, no wheezing. He woke up at 7 wanting to go to school. After nap on Tuesday he had another 3 hour coughing fit where he couldn't catch his breath or stop coughing for the life of him. Then it stopped. Peace and quiet. He started playing like nothing happened. Until 11:30 when he crawled into bed with Al and I and proceeded to vibrate and cough himself to death for a record 5.5 hours.

"Mommy, I don't feel *cough, cough* good *cough*."

"I know baby. We're going to see the pediatrician in the morning."

"**cough** Okay *cough* *cough* *cough*."

Back to sleep for another few hours with the random single cough here and there but nothing serious until I woke up to call the doctor in the morning. Appt at 10:45. Great. I'm going to miss my last (and very important) lecture before our big exam on Monday to take Carson to the doctor. Oh well. Again, with the sacrifices.

We get to the doctors and his lungs sound great. I already knew that. They rule out pneumonia. Then I hear what I had been fearing...... PERTUSSIS, aka "whooping cough". Lovely. Wasn't he vaccinated against that with his DTP series? Oh yes, yes he was. Great. They shove two long swabs with metal handles up Carson's nose to send to the lab. Carson gets a bloody nose. To add insult to injury, in comes the RN to give him his flu shot. Ouch. At least he was able to pick which leg and pick out a blue sport car toy out of the treasure chest box. We'll know tomorrow if he does in fact have whooping cough and if we can expect another 2 months of this lovely cough and a nice round of antibiotics to go along with it. Wish us luck. At least we can enjoy the periods of calm between the coughing storms and cherish the fact that Eli doesn't seem to be affected at all!