Cool Kids Have Asthma

I've previously blogged about Kaylynn's coughing problem, but never really got that much into it. In a nutshell, every single night she coughs. Sometimes so bad that she starts gagging and wakes herself up. She also coughs during the day as well, but not as much. I thought it was odd that she coughs as much as she does and I feel so terrible for her because the coughs are so deep and painful sounding. Sometimes after she would go through a coughing attack she would wimper and whine. Poor thing. So anyways, this started in December. She seemed to have this everlasting cold, then spring came and we figured she was coughing because of the blooming, then we thought it was our house (air filters/humidifier/dog). We made excuses for it because the doctor never really seemed that worried about it and I never want to be the parent that overreacts. At KK's 18 month checkup, we again mentioned the cough and Dr. Campbell suggested we try Singulair. We did that every day for a month but nothing seemed to change. Since I took the day off yesterday to hang out with Jeff and Daisy, I decided to kill two birds with one stone and take KK in to the doctor first thing in the morning. Turns out, KK has asthma. I guess it's pretty common in babies that had reflux and eczema (which KK did). She also said that if a baby coughs more than 2 times a month, that is also a sign. Kaylynn literally coughs EVERY SINGLE night.

We got a nebulizer and Budesonide (steroid) and were told to do nightly breathing treatments. I figured this would be something we would try for a couple weeks, but that's not the case. We have to do the nightly treatments for at least 6 months and then KK will be reevaluated. I've heard lots of people outgrow asthma so I'm hoping that will be the case for KK! If not, then I'll bedazzle her mask and inhaler so she could be the cool kid at school. :)

Tonight was our first attempt at the breathing treatments. The doctor told us to put on her favorite tv show to calm her down. So we put on Dora of course. As I put the mask up to her face, she freaked out. It must have been so scary for her!








After a couple minutes, Ty was able to calm her down.





See KK, it wasn't so bad!