A lesson Learned

At 3am the other morning I had to call poison control. I hate to admit it but I gave my daughter too much cough medicine.
It all started a few days ago when Hannah's little runny nose turned into a terrible cough. Wednesday morning 6:30am; She woke up barely able to breath. She was sucking in air so hard that I could see her collarbone clearly. In the emergency room she did better after a breathing treatment on a nebulizer machine and some steroids called prednisone. I didn't realize how similarly they treat croup like an asthma attack. Which I'm quite familiar with.
Thursday she's much better with breathing. On docs orders I'm giving her breathing treatments on my home nebulizer. But her cough is a loose cough with a constant runny nose and a fever in the 103 area. We barely made it through the night waking up every couple hours until about 4am when she rested soundly. Friday, I took her to see the doctor. "It's probably just viral" was the substitute docs reply after a few tests and an exam.
So now were back to the almost overdose part of my story. Imagine going on a few hours of sleep each night for three nights. It's 3am and your toddler is coughing so much that half the time she can't catch her breath. I gave her some Delsym and Motrin for her fever, a drink of juice and a cuddle or two and tucked her into bed. As I was dragging myself down the hallway a clear thought came to my mind so hard it was like a brick wall. The thought was "did you check the label?" I went into the kitchen and learned that I had given her a cough medicine a few hours earlier mixed into a decongestant. I couldn't believe I did that. I'm always really careful with dosages. I called 1-800-3-poison an agency that's ran by pharmacists in Arkansas. It turns out that I didn't give her too too much. I'd have to have given her four more times then what I gave her to really hurt her. But I stayed up and watched her. I woke her up to see if she was coherent. and then let her go back to sleep.
I learned a valuable lesson during all this. And that's to listen to the prompting of the Holy Spirit. I can't describe the overwhelming feeling I had to go back and check the label. I didn't hurt my child beyond repair but I sure as heck had a wake up call. I'm just really thankful for a Heavenly Father that watches over us and doesn't get sleep deprived.
Oh and I also learned that friends are pretty valuable. Either for advice over the phone or even to go and get some popsicles for your dehydrated kid.

Photos: Hannah giving her horse a breathing treatment with her dino mask.
As you can see Hannah was feeling better. The Princess bandaids went to a good cause. Each toy has it's own bandaid and magnet.