It’s always concerning when your child gets sick. There’s times when they become so miserable that nothing you do cheers them up, and it’s a horrible feeling. Every cough, or sign of discomfort is an added weight on your shoulders. As parents, every part of us wants to protect our kids and make them feel better, but sometimes, all we can do is watch, give cuddles and wait for the sickness to pass so we can see our happy and lively children back to being themselves again.

Recently, Hope began showing signs that she was fighting off a cold. Within a couple of days, we found ourselves on high alert, constantly checking temperatures and monitoring oxygen levels. When Hope is sick there is a different level of fear that sets in. We have seen Hope be good one day and go completely down hill the next. We’ve had week long stays in hospital because we haven’t quite caught it early enough but we’ve also avoided week long stays because we’ve taken her in just in time. It’s completely different from when the boys are sick. It’s not that we don’t worry, we just know that they’re bodies are more able to fight it.

I thought I’d share a little more about what it often looks like when Hope gets sick.

Usually it will start with a runny nose. When Hope has a runny nose, it’s obvious as we can see it. It’ll often start like it does for everyone, runny and clear. As it gets thicker and has more colour, we know the risk of infection and more serious symptoms are potentially on their way.

A lot of the time after this, we begin to see a change in Hope’s behaviour. She’ll get upset easier, she’ll eat slower than usual and she’ll get upset at dinner time. This is often a sign of her just not feeling herself, or it could be that she’s got a sore throat. It’s difficult at this stage because she can’t tell us. She doesn’t understand, she just knows it hurts or doesn’t feel good. So while it’s often one of the first symptoms we would feel ourselves, we just have no idea if Hope feels it, or how bad it may be.

By now, we have already pulled out the thermometer and started checking for temperatures regularly. It’s crazy how quickly a temperature can go from normal to feverish when you don’t check it. We find Hope’s temperatures will often spike in the afternoon and she’ll have a long sleep. It’ll come down a little before lifting again as we put her to bed in the evening. We often have a list on the fridge of times, temperatures and whether we’ve given panadol or nurofen. There are days where we are giving it every 4 hours just to keep the temperature below 40 and to keep Hope comfortable however, we also don’t want to rely on it and know that her body needs to be able to learn to fight. It’s a difficult balance but one that we feel is important to get right.

When we should be sleeping ourselves at night, we find ourselves more restless than other nights. We stay up late checking not only the temperature, but also oxygen levels. We stay up late initially just listening out for signs that Hopes situation is worsening. Every time we hear a cough, we listen for a bark, if there’s multiple coughs, we’ll go in and check on eveyrthing again. We’ll watch her chest to see if she’s breathing heavy or if she’s working hard to breath. We check how fast her heart is beating and check to see if she is showing any signs of distress. Then we sit and wait again. When we do eventually go to bed, we try to sleep but find ourselves waking constantly with every little noise, just in case it’s Hope again. We live on high alert ready to make a move as soon as we need to.

Just recently while Hope was unwell, we put her to bed at the usual time, and as we were getting ready for bed ourselves, Hope began to cough. When I went in to check, her breathing was fast, so I got the oxygen and heart rate monitor and her oxygen levels were low. Her temperature was high and I was ready to make a move. The problem was while the oxygen levels were only at 90, they weren’t dipping and staying below this. Having had multiple stays in hospital before, I knew that it wouldn’t be enough for them to need to keep her in hospital, and we didn’t want to go prematurely. We gave Panadol and took Hope into bed with us so that we could monitor closely. We made the decision that we would watch closely for half an hour or so.  A part of me wanted to go to the hospital but another part of me had a feeling she would be ok. There’s an internal battle that goes on at this point, trying to work out what’s best for Hope. Thankfully, this time, once the panadol set in, Hope’s temperature dropped, her heart rate came down and she was sleeping soundly. While the oxygen levels weren’t high, they weren’t low enough to need assistance and she pushed through.

it doesn’t always happen like this though. Sometimes, we check before going to bed and her oxygen levels are below 90 and not picking up. Sometimes her temperature is above 38 and even after panadol, it doesn’t go down a lot. That’s when we make the trip to the hospital. With our local hospital not as equipped, we have to take her to Westmead. Westmead is at least an hour away, so we pack a bag with enough for an overnight stay or two for ourselves and a bunch of things for Hope, not knowing how long we’ll be there.

The drive is probably the worst part of everything. It’s often late at night and we’re tired, we possibly haven’t slept much for a couple of days while we’ve been watching and then the whole drive there, we question ourselves. Are we doing the right thing? Are we too late? Should we have made the move earlier? Is Hope okay and will they just send us home? Should we have just waited and gone to the GP in the morning? The whole time we are asking ourselves these questions, we’ve often got Hope whinging in her seat, tired and uncomfortable.

We don’t really know what’s going to happen when we reach the hospital. Sometimes we have been sent home and other times we stay. Either way, we feel a small amount of weight gone from our shoulders, either because we’ve been told that Hope is ok, or because we know that she is going to be well looked after by the doctors.

So if we don’t go to the hospital, when do we stop worrying about her being unwell? I guess, when we start to see improvement. The temperatures stop, the coughing fits are no longer happening overnight and the oxygen levels pick up. If the oxygen levels are below 95, we will continue to monitor, but once we see them reaching 96 or higher and staying there, we know that Hope is on the mend and will check less regularly until we are confident that she is ok. We’ll still be watching for signs of worsening again but usually a few days later, all that’s left is that usual lingering cough, the one that we all seem to be left with for a few weeks after we’ve been sick.

Hopefully with the winter season coming to an end, we’ll see less sickness however, in the past, Hope’s visits to hospital have been in the transitioning between Spring and Summer. It’s when we least expect it. So while winter is over and the cooler weather is disappearing, we will still be watching out for illness and keeping our thermometer and oxygen monitor close.