I Hate Croup

**Caution -- portions of this post are a bit gross**

You may notice I am posting this in the wee hours of the morning [my clock says 2:31 a.m.]. While it is true that I regularly go to bed way too late and am known for sending emails at horrible hours, I am normally sound asleep at this time of night. Tonight, however, I was happily typing the previous post when I heard the unmistakable barking and gagging of a croupy cough. It sounded more gaggy than normal, so I ran upstairs to Morgan's room. She was coughing and gasping and spitting up mucous. I grabbed her out of bed, took her to the bathroom, and did the best I could to simultaneously turn on the shower and hold her over the toilet. She proceeded to vomit. After a few minutes in the steamy bathroom, her breathing was still much more labored than usual, which gives me the worst panicky feeling, so I turned off the hot water and bundled her and myself into coats, hats, slippers, and blankets for a trip outside. I hollered at Jeremy, who was all ready for bed, to please give Morgan a clean pillowcase and bring us an extra blanket. We went out on the front porch and huddled up. [At least we could get a little chuckle out of the situation when Jeremy brought a blanket for us in his underwear. True love or no shame?] Morgan seemed to calm down for a little while, but her breathing was so raspy. After a bit, she still didn't seem to be getting a good breath and threw up again, this time all over her coat and soft blankie and the porch. We went back to the bathroom to clean up and try the hot shower again. It took a good chunk of time, but she finally started to breathe easier and rest. I carried her downstairs with me so I could Google croup remedies and when to go to the doctor. I'm not sure why I do that, because I already know that I probably should take her but won't. By now she was asleep in my arms, still sounding pretty horrible but asleep. I put her back to bed, put the humidifier in her room, took some ibuprofen, and went to clean up the vomit on the porch. In case you ever wondered, it takes less than an hour for throw up to freeze in the middle of a January night in Utah. I had to scrape the frozen chunks off the concrete with a plastic grocery sack protecting my hands. Mmmm. Lovely. Finally, I went inside to complete the cleanup. Now I should be in bed, but it always takes a little while to come down off of the adrenalin of these kinds of scenarios. And I needed some chocolate [evidence of my emotional eating habits]. I seriously hate croup. I know there are much, much worse things. But holding your baby, or three-year-old, and listening to her sucking at the air and just hoping you're not killing her by your failure to rush immediately to the emergency room is an awful feeling. Hopefully that was the worst of it. She seems to be resting now and her lips are a healthy pink, so I guess I'll lumber off to bed now. Sleep tight!