My Scariest Day

Sunday was the scariest day of my life.

Mike was up and on his way out the door for some meetings at church at 6:30am.  He thought he could hear some weird breathing coming from Bennett's room, so he decided to go in and check on him (which has never happened before).  When he looked in his crib, he found Bennett with his blanket over his face.  This was not unusual.  Bennett loves to sleep with his blankies covering his face, and will pull them up himself.  When Mike pulled back the blanket he could tell that he was breathing differently, but it was still dark so he did not notice anything else.  He came back to our room and told me that he thought Bennett sounded weird, so I told him to go and bring him to our room.  When Mike picked him up he knew something was wrong.  

When he brought Bennett into our room, my heart sank.

He was so pale, almost transparent.

He wasn't responding to us.

His breathing was so shallow.

His mouth and chest was covered in thick mucous.

I immediately started sobbing.

I put him in his car seat, as Mike was gathering the things I would need.

Luckily we have an emergency room within a mile from our home.

I ran inside with him.

I could barely get any words out.

They brought him back, and started working on him right away.

They put him on oxygen.

They searched for a vein to start an iv.

They poked and poked and he wasn't even crying.

Finally the had success, and they pumped him full of fluid with an iv.

They gave him a chest x-ray.

They drew blood to run tests.

They did an EKG.

The looks on the doctor's faces scared me.

They were worried.

Finally after about 90 minutes he started to turn pink again.

He started opening his eyes.

He started to whine and cry.

I was so relieved.

The doctors and nurses were so happy.

Once he was stable, they called for an ambulance to take us to the children's hospital downtown.  They sent PICU nurses with the ambulance, to take care of Bennett on the way over.

Mike and the kids met us at the hospital.

We were assured by the doctor that he would be okay.

He told us that he thought it was "near-SIDS".

Mike had found him in time.

I am so grateful that he was prompted to go check on him.
He wouldn't have lasted much longer.

It was an emotional day.

Full of what-ifs.

But so grateful that I wasn't going to have to deal with those outcomes.

We are still in the hospital.

He has pneumonia from aspirating some of the mucous during his struggle.

But he will be okay.

I am so thankful that we were being watched over.

They are monitoring his blood oxygen level, 

and giving him a strong antibiotic for the pneumonia.

We should be able to go home tomorrow.

Armed with a sensor that will not let this happen again.