Momic/Dadic

Momic/Dadic: noun. Moms (momic) and dads (dadic) that act as doctors, nurses, and/or medics when their child is sick or hurt.

So I promised to say more about Monkey Son #1's ambulance ride. Here's what happened.

Around 10:30pm about a week and a half ago, Monkey Son #1 woke up coughing pretty hard. I went to check on him and found that he was barely breathing. He was struggling and whispering that he couldn't breath. Husband and I brought him out of his room and gave him something to drink, but it didn't help. We dressed him and Husband put him in the car to go to the emergency room while I stayed with Monkey Son #2.

A few moments later, Husband pulled into the driveway again, opened his door, but did not get out. He was calling 9-1-1. Monkey's breathing, he decided, was too bad and he didn't have the time to drive him to the hospital.

A few minutes later, I was trying to stay out of the way of 4 paramedics. They gave Monkey Son #1 some sort of breathing treatment and took him away in the ambulance. He thought that was the coolest thing.

A very helpful neighbor came to offer her assistance. Her teen daughter stayed with Monkey Son #2 and the neighbor came with me to the hospital. I let her go shortly after. They wouldn't let her in the room, anyway.

More breathing treatments at the hospital. At one point Monkey Son #1 looked over at us with a breathing mask on and said, "Look! I'm Star Wars!" He also pretended to be a fighter pilot. And pretended to be a fighter jet.

In the end, he was diagnosed with a sudden case of croup and given a prescription for an inhaler, liquid steroid, and a need for a cool mist humidifier.

And then I became the momic. It was incredibly hard to get him to take his medicine. I was up early the next morning making the bathroom as humid as possible so he could breath in the moist air when he woke up hacking because we hadn't gotten the humidifier yet (it was only 6:30am and we hadn't been relased from the hospital until 3 am). Checking temperatures. Monitoring medicines. Monitoring food intake. Monitoring liquid intake. Watching for signs of getting better or worse.

He's now all better. Now if only Monkey Son #2 could get over his cold.