OK, when you have three children in three years, you are in survival mode. Life is not easy at all -- in fact, it's downright madness. But you learn to do certain things like a well-oiled machine. You have to, or you will die. My morning routine, people -- it's a well-oiled machine. I get up at 5:00 am and get myself ready, then proceed to get the toddlers ready, and then -- when everything else is ready -- I wake up Charlie, change him, give him his Prevacid, and throw him in the car. And this is key, b/c he can't eat until 30 minutes after the Prevacid, so the drive to daycare gives us JUST enough time to get him there so he can eat immediately upon arrival. Which is why I have a new-found hatred for one of my old friends: the nebulizer...Seriously, whoever thought up the concept of the nebulizer as a way of dispensing medicine for children either has none, or hates all people who DO have children. I can tell you this -- he or she does NOT have three young children. Because anyone who thinks "I know, I will create a device for the dispensing of medication that involves a young child wearing a MASK, with a LOUD machine shooting steam into their faces, and it will take 30 minutes per medication" is on crack. CRACK, folks. And this person clearly invented this machine for one reason: he or she HATES ME.
See, going back to the well-oiled machine concept, I can tell you one thing. I have NO time to add 45 minutes of nebulizing into my morning. None of my children are yet capable of dressing themselves, feeding themselves, or, really, much of anything aside from whining, begging for more milk, and beating on each other/crying. Add in the fact
that my husband is still at work when I am doing my morning routine, AND the fact that Charlie has to take his Prevacid 30 minutes before he eats -- and anything added into my morning routine becomes disaster. And now, enter the nebulizer...Charlie has been wheezing for weeks now. WEEKS. And while I am used to asthmatic kids, I'm not used to kids that don't respond to oral steroids plus the neb. So now Charlie is on (only asthma parents need listen here -- ther rest of you may doze off) Prednisolone, as well as Pulmicort and Albuterol via neb, and that means AT LEAST 45 MINUTES of nebulizing. And let me add that most of the time that 45 minutes involves me holding him down, while screaming, and trying to keep his flailing arms from pulling the mask off his face. It is SO MUCH FUN. NOT.
All of this means that I now have to wake up earlier than God, get myself dressed and ready for work, then get Charlie up and dress him, give him the Prevacid and Prednisolone, plop him in his jumperoo, and give him Albuterol while watching Playhouse Disney, hoping he'll leave the mask on. Then I fetch one of the tods and wrestle them into their clothes, all the while going back and forth to Charlie in this "neb on, neb off, neb on, neb off" dance where he screams, tries to eat the mask, pulls it off his face, screams more, fights me, etc. And -- asthma parents again -- you know how you can hear the sound when the neb mask comes off the face? I can hear it from halfway up the staircase to get Katie out of bed. I'm all "Damn. There it goes again!" I get halfway through the Albuterol (by now the tods MAY be dressed) and usually just add the Pulmicort b/c, really, who has time? And then on goes the dance, while I try to fight the tods into their coats and shoes, and into the car. I think Charlie is only getting about half of his doses, but what do you want from me? Because now he's STARVING, and screaming for his bottle, and I don't have time to give him a bottle before daycare! I take it back -- I probably COULD give him a bottle and just be late, but in the meantime Jack and Kate would fight so much that I would surely kill them. So I throw the kids all in the car (a lot of screaming ensues at this time, of course, b/c Jack and Kate are THE SLOWEST CHILDREN PLACED ON EARTH and it takes them a good hour to get up in their carseats--another rant, another time) and drive them to school where I hand over a screaming, starving Charlie to his poor teacher so he can eat.So, long story short, I hate the neb. HAAAAAAATTTTE the neb. More than Charlie does, matter of fact. And I hate the fact that I was not spared at least ONE child that didn't have asthma. Sigh....
Jack's first neb, 6 mos. March, 2007
Kate's first neb, in hossy, 1 month. November, 2007. Kate wins the prize for earliest neb. See that tiny turtle mask they used for her? I saved it as some kind of sick souvenir of her time in the hospital. My poor, sick baby...
