Category: Samuel

We spent most of the day Sunday at the pediatric urgent care. Sam had been fighting a fever and cough and it seemed to be getting worse instead of better. I was on the fence whether or not to take him to the doc that day, but when we were on our way to my grandma’s house for lunch, he was coughing so hard he was gagging.

So off we went to the urgent care. (but not before dropping Kate off at Grandma’s – urgent care with one kid is bad enough.)

When we arrived there was a posted 2-hour wait to see the doctor, so it freaked me out when the nurse took one look at Sam’s chest and said she needed to take us right back to the exam room. His oxygen levels were low, but apparently not alarmingly so (I think she said 94 but I have no idea what that means), and we were taken off the fast-track.

He was so pitiful, laying in my arms pale and feverish. They gave him ibuprofen and a breathing treatment, and he got a lot better.

Anyway, after two breathing treatments, a chest x-ray and some steroids, we were sent home – he had a double ear infection and a bad chest cold, but fortunately it hadn’t turned into pneumonia yet.

Now he’s working on a course of antibiotics and an inhaler – and the steroid prednisone.

I cringed when I heard prednisone – Andy was on it briefly a few years ago for poison ivy and he had a terrible reaction to it. One of the side effects is that it can raise blood sugar, which means it is a GREAT medication to give a type 1 diabetic. {insert sarcasm punctuation mark}

Another side effect is that it makes kids CRAZY.

The nurse told me he might be “a little hyped up,” but that was an understatement. Last night he was running in circles and couldn’t seem to stop. He was on me like white on rice, but even though he insisted on constantly sitting on my lap, he also insisted on constantly hitting/kicking me and yelling “Bad Mommy!”

It was awesome. But not unusual, according to my very scientific facebook poll. I put something about him being a nutjob on my status, and a number of parents commented saying that insanity was to be expected (and actually a doctor and a pharmacist commented so it was scientific!). A few also said something about insomnia but I refused to even consider that possibility (and fortunately he slept great. knock on wood.)

Oh and did I mention the urgent care doc said not to send Sam to school until at least Thursday? Yeah. Lovely. Yesterday my dad stayed with him, I’m here with him today and tomorrow is Andy’s tour of duty.

So I am going to be here all day with this amped up version of my son. Any advice for living through it? I’m sure he’ll be fine, it’s me I’m worried about now!

If you’ve ever seen Sam in real life, chances are you’ve also seen Baby.

Baby is Sam’s beloved teddy bear. Baby’s not actually the kind of bear that’s intended to be, you know, played with – he actually originated as a holder for a Babies R Us gift card. Like this – only blue.

(Photo credit to consumerist.com, who points out that this bear comes with a tag that warns of its lead content, which is awesome. However upon further reading, I found out that said tag is only attached in the state of Illinois, which has a lower threshold of acceptable lead levels in baby toys than Ohio does. Which explains why Andy and I didn’t notice the warning on any of the 15 versions of Baby we purchased in Sam’s first 1.5 years of life, and also explains a lot of other things as well. Insert Ohio joke here.)

I’m also not sure when Sam became so attached to him, but the first pictorial evidence I can find of Baby’s existence is shortly before Sam’s first birthday.

See how nice and clean Baby is there?

That may or may not have been the original Baby. For a while, Sam had to have his Baby at all times, but Baby was interchangeable. I remember Andy going in to Babies R Us once to buy 7 or 8 of the things so we were never without one, and he made the check out person promise that they had 5,000 more in the back and that they weren’t going to run out. We even had a name for them – Backup Baby.

Unfortunately, last February when I was in Nashville at Blissdom and Andy was home with both kids and all three of them had a stomach virus and were puking their brains out, Sam decided to play “hide and seek” with Baby. Despite the fact that he did the hiding, he couldn’t seem to do the seeking and no one could find Baby. So, Andy broke out Backup Baby. Of course, Sam chose that moment to decide there was one Baby and one Baby only, and he wasn’t having it. Andy tried everything – he colored Backup Baby with marker, rubbed some dirt on his face… he even shaved off some of Backup Baby’s fur with a beard trimmer to make him look more worn out… to no avail.

They had a really great weekend.

A week or so later, I found the real Baby in a drawer in Kate’s closet. Sam and Baby were reunited. And they haven’t been apart since.

We’ve had some close calls – we’ve left him at restaurants, we’ve dropped him on the floor at stores, and most notably, we’ve left him in a hotel room and checked out (fortunately I rescued him from a pile of dirty bedding that was wadded up on the floor as the room was being cleaned) – but Sam doesn’t go anywhere without his Baby. He’s a little worse for the wear, but he’s still kickin’.

I know that someday Baby will end up like Woody in Toy Story – relegated to the bottom of the toy box, forgotten. But right now, he is a great source of comfort to Sam, which is in turn a great comfort to me.

Baby is a part of the family.