A gift for Aunt K

HL's school offers a program where teaching students from the local university come in and teach free classes after school. This semester, HL participated in the "3D Postcard" class which promised exploration into postcards, where they came from and creating a personal postcard. HL told us a month ago that he was making a postcard for his Aunt K, depicting a trip we took together to Iowa. He presented her with his surprise last Saturday when she came over. the postcard shows some of the people we hung out with, the grasses and corn we saw, even the Super 8 Motel where we stayed!

Asthma

As many of you know, HL was officially diagnosed with Asthma in November. He was put on the preventative Pulmicort which is an inhaled powder steroid. Within a week, he no longer needed his albuterol, and he had stopped his dry coughing that he's had for years. As he had always had this dry cough, we just figured it was the dry air here and never really thought twice about it. Apparently, it was asthma all along. Anyway, due to premiums increasing to ungodly levels, we had to change the boys' health insurance coverage. We found a policy that cut the monthly premium in half, but they refuse to cover any medications that are not generic. Fine. Then, we discover that there are no generic medications to treat asthma; the Pulmicort he was on costs $130/month. Not so fine. When we told his doctor this, he gave us several weeks worth of another preventative (Singulair) in samples. HL does okay on this, but not as well as he did on the Pulmicort. On Monday, we took HL to an asthma specialist who was nonplussed by the fact that our insurance was refusing medications. By doing that, he says, the insurance company increases the risk of having to pay hospitalization costs. Their shortsighted frugalness will only backfire. He gave us several more weeks of samples and promised to write a letter to the insurance telling them just how ridiculous they are being. Oh, it feels good to have him on our side. He seems like a really great guy! One more little thing about asthma- AW seems to have had his first asthma attack this past Sunday night. Splendid, eh? He was sleeping with us in our bed, then woke up with a start, gasping for air. He sounded croopy to me, so I did the shower steam therapy which helped a little but not much. Then, I took a chance and gave AW two puffs of HL's albuterol. That did the trick. He was breathing well enough to fall back asleep. Perhaps we taught HL to share a bit too well...

Illness Report

I hope that I am not jinxing myself with this post... So far this winter (knock on wood) we have been very fortunate in the illness department. I had feared that as soon as HL went into kindergarten we would be inundated with nasty germs and steady colds. But, until two weeks ago, we had nothing. Then, two weeks ago, HL gradually started coughing on Tuesday. Wednesday, he was coughing but was well enough to go to school. By Wednesday evening, however, he was nursing a fever and coughing almost continuously. It was obvious that he couldn't attend Royal Rangers (explanation in a following post) that evening as he couldn't even get a word in between coughs to protest! That night, he coughed quite a bit in bed so when I woke up I asked him how he was feeling. "Not good", he said. I kept him home from school. But not an hour later, he was up and playing; still coughing, but feeling okay. Then, on this Tuesday (what is it with Tuesdays?!) AW started coughing. As with his brother, he was coughing a little on Wednesday but did just fine at preschool. I picked him up, we went to the post office and came home for lunch. Somehow between the time leaving his school and getting home, he became too sick to even sit at the table for lunch. He just laid still and quiet on the couch. AW. Quiet. And still. Unbelievable, I know. This is how I knew he was very, very ill. His temperature was up to 102.5, his breathing was shallow, his cheeks flushed, and his eyes were bloodshot and so watery that tears rolled down his cheeks. I called the doctor; he said it sounded like RSV and prescribed Prednisolone for inflammation. Within an hour of receiving Pred and Tylenol, AW was up, building Legos! And Thursday, he was coughing and still breathing a little shallow, but certainly tolerable- back to the AW we know so well. So, even though we were struck with two bad bouts with coughs, I still consider us very fortunate. How many parents can say that their child healed in just a day?!? And how do I get this ability; to heal so quickly?