The ultimate roller coaster ride

I have officially submitted my application for Mother of the Year. I think I stand an excellent chance to walk away with the honor this year after this last week. It is one of those events that I just keep replaying in my mind, kicking myself for being so dumb.

Kaiya had her second to last gymnastics meet of the season on Wednesday night in Ft. Collins. She has worked so dang hard with her eye on her main goal of making it to "state". She had to score a 34.0 in the All-Around to make it and she has come so close, but just missed it a couple times. I kept telling her that it didn't matter if she made it, that it was her first year on the team, etc., etc. but, of course, she didn't really hear me.

Wednesday night was a late start day for school meaning they didn't have to be there until just before lunch. Kaiya slept in and was kind of a couch potato that morning. She's had a cold for a few days and a cough, but nothing that kept her from doing her normal stuff. It was a gorgeous day, so I had planned to walk the girls to school.

Clue #1 that something wasn't right--Kaiya begged me to drive them. I picked them up after school and Kaiya told me she was so tired, but excited for her meet. She got ready and we headed to Ft. Collins. The whole drive there, she just laid with her head resting on the window--clue #2. We got to the gym and she just didn't look right. She couldn't articulate what was wrong, but just said she was wiped out. She talked her coaches into letting her skip the warm up and decided to just do her routines cold turkey. Clue #3--about half way through the meet, I noticed that the only way she would stand is if she was hunched over (known as tripoding in medicine).

She asked me if we could say a little prayer, which we did, and I had already decided I would take her in to the doc the next day. She had an awesome meet and gave me the thumbs up before her bar routine telling me she felt fine. She finished the meet winning the bars, but it looked like she was 0.4 short of qualifying to state. She was crushed, but I was more worried about her breathing. I noticed that she was starting to work really hard to breathe--ribs sucking in, breathing really fast, etc.

The drama intensified when her coach told me that they had flashed her floor score wrong (there was a little girl who must have been dyslexic because she kept posting scores backwards). Instead of an 8.05, she had actually received an 8.50. She qualified!!! She thought she didn't make it, so when I told her the good news, she just started bawling--hunched over and all. At that point, I was thinking it was time to get her to urgent care. I got lucky that my work bag was in the car, so I listened to her lungs and she wasn't moving any air on her right side. At this point, I'm getting pretty nervous. She sat folded over in half the whole way home and I called work on the way and found out that the Children's Hospital satellite facility that is close to us only had 6 kids there, so off we went.

The doc at Children's thought the same thing I did--pneumonia (because one side of her lungs sounded so much worse than the other). We walked back for a chest x-ray and she puked all over the place and now she was white as a sheet. Within a couple minutes, the doc came back to tell me that it wasn't pneumonia but that she was in the middle of a severe asthma attack. Her lungs were so hyperinflated from air trapping that her diaphram was flat as a pancake. Doug has mild asthma as does his mom, so I wasn't shocked, but she has never had a problem before in her life.

She was admitted overnight and started on round the clock breathing treatments, oxygen and steroids. We were hoping to go home the next day, but she just took a while to rebound, so we stayed two nights. She got excellent care from the staff there (I'm the first to admit that we took advantage of her being an employee's kid) and finally got to come home on Friday afternoon. She was so cute because everyone that walked into her room got to hear her say that she qualified.

My brother, Brandon, taught Kaiya at an early age to answer the question of "Who's tougher than Kaiya?" to say, "NOBODY!". I think he nailed it when he asked her that question this time.

Looking at her x-ray, I have absolutely no idea how she got through that meet. She had no business being there. :( So, on behalf of the academy, I will politely accept my Mother of the Year award and try to move on!

Right before the meet--squatting down

Terrible picture quality, but this was her comfort position

After her floor routine

After finding out she qualified!

Matching the sheet color at Children's

Getting some needed relief!