Zoo Escape

Last night around 12:00 AM a seal that had escaped from the zoo pushed open my bedroom door and woke me from a deep sleep by barking and crying.

Actually, it was Evan. But he did sound a great deal like a barking seal. I knew immediately that it was his semi annual bout with the croup. The croup has always been Evan's disease of choice, and if a croup germ is within a million mile radius of him, he will catch it.

With his asthma, it is always a roller coaster ride, and last night was a particularly scary one. He was grabbing his throat, which was making horrible squeaking sounds with every indrawn breath, and he was croaking "I can't breathe!"

I hit the ground running and had him sucking down albuterol from his nebulizer in under 5 minutes. Then we spent some quality time in the bathroom with hot water running for steam. I set up the steam humidifier in his room, and finally got him comfortable. I headed back to bed around 1:30, but was so keyed up from being worried about him, it was a lot later when I finally dozed off.

I got back up at 5:45 to put in my call for a sub for my classroom, and tried to keep myself awake with Twitter, but accidentally fell back to sleep, and woke up at 8:30. Which gave the toddlers ample time to destroy their bedroom. Charlie had squirted lotion all over the changing table, the carpet, and Sammy's head. Sammy was spraying air freshener all over the diapers he had spread on the floor, along with every item previously located in the changing table drawers.

Somehow we made it to the doctor's office by 10:00 where croup was confirmed and steroids were prescribed. We headed to Walgreens where it took $37 of crap to entertain the toddlers and keep them in the cart. A price I was willing to pay after having to spend an hour in the waiting and exam rooms of the doctors office with Sammy.

I was totally jonesing for a nap, but because the universe was definitely laughing at my expense today, neither toddler took a nap. And instead redestroyed their room.

When Jeff came home from work tonight (late because he is going to take tomorrow off with Evan so he stayed to get some things done), he ruined what was left of my sanity by announcing that he will be going to Las Vegas the last week in October for work. He will be gone over parent teacher conferences, which means I need to arrange a sitter. AND OVER HALLOWEEN. I do NOT want to deal with this holiday on my own. God Bless America. Somebody get me a drink. And some tranquilizers.