Things I never wanted to be an expert on:

Oral steroids.

Albuterol.

Pulmicort.

Prednisolone.

Orapred.

20-day Augmentin regimens.

Nebulizers, 

        inhalers, 

             breathing treatments.

RAD (Reactive Airway Disease) with URD (Upper Respiratory Distress)

Asthma.

Sinus infections/recurrent bronchitis/pneumonia/upper respiratory infections.

Coughing/wheezing.

I feel like my poor little girl is turning into a pharmacy.  With no improvement since Monday's visit to MGH (to see the Pediatric Pulmonologist,)  we spoke with him again today and learned a few things:

 1. She definitely, absolutely has "Reactive Airway Disease." (clearly, I just spent about 45 minutes googling this to familiarize myself with the new diagnosis).  Not fun stuff.

 2. She is never going to be the kind of child that "just gets a cold." For whatever reason, the moment a cold begins to develop in her, it immediately moves beneath her vocal chords (apparently this is the distinguishing line between "cold" and " lung/bronchial infections...colds occur above vocal chords and never move below them, bronchial infections are below....) and ferociously infects her bronchial tubes & lungs, resulting in pneumonia, bronchitis, tremendous coughing, wheezing, and thick mucous. This may or may not result in a long-term asthma diagnosis; we are in 'wait-and-see' mode as far as that goes.

3. Oral steroids apparently do nothing for her, since we are now on day #3 with ZERO improvement; (Negative improvement, actually, if you take into consideration that she's actually gotten worse.) Therefore, we are back to a 10 to 20-day Augmentin regimen to see if it was an underlying lung infection causing all of this, and hoping that the antibiotic does the trick. Please, augmentin, do the trick!


 Here's to hoping (PRAYING) that this medicine works, and that my poor little girly can get some much-needed rest from the coughing/wheezing/gagging/vomiting that has ensued for the past several days here... I honestly can't even stand to watch and listen to her struggle so much anymore, especially since there is nothing I can offer her in the way of relief.   All I can give to her at the moment is a warm lap, a big hug, and a rub of her back- things that certainly don't remedy the pain and discomfort she's experiencing.  In her four-year old little world, she just wants to feel better, and her Momma can't fix it for her.  And that just sucks. Unequivocally, this is the hardest, saddest part about being a mommy  :-(

In related news, I am absolutely terrified of the utter heartbreak that will occur if she's not better by Friday and learns that she has to miss her first ever, highly anticipated, much talked about Preschool Valentine's party-- complete with cookies, cupcakes, and of course the obligatory swapping of adorable, handwritten Valentines among friends. Oh, and the Valentine's outfit (complete with oodles of glittery, heart-shaped bling)  that she picked out last week just for the occasion. Ugh...I can almost taste the sad, salty tears on her cheeks already...

PLEASE Augmentin, I'm begging you here-- show us a miracle. Preferably by Friday, thanks.

Fingers crossed...