Passing Out & Croupe

This past week has been one of the strangest pre-Christmas weeks I have experienced.  It began with Daphne throwing a fit last Tuesday night when Burke took some magnets out of her hand.  Magnets people - that's all!  But for some reason it was unpardonable and Daphne let us know it by PASSING OUT.  I don't know if I've talked about this on here before, but our sweet niece Millie passes out 3 or 4 times a day.  The littlest thing can set her off and she'll start crying until she opens her mouth big and wide without a single sound, stops breathing and eventually faints.  It has been a horrible trial for my sister Cassie, but the pediatrician says it's not that uncommon and although it is frightening, it apparently is not hurting her brain or anything.  Anyway, I'm thinking Millie must have whispering her passing out trick to Daphne at the Ugly Sweater Party because next thing we know she is doing it herself!  It was terrifying to see her lips turn blue and her little body fall limp into Burke's arms.  Right then the doorbell rang and I was crying and freaking out when I answered it, totally alarming poor Brogan Felshaw who brought Christmas treats at exactly the wrong time!  Luckily Daphne hasn't fainted since then and in some ways I think it was a good experience for me to be able to relate to my sister a bit more and help validate her feelings as to how scary it is when that happens.  I hope sweet Millie will grow out of it soon.

A couple of days later Burke was asked to drive nearly to Phoenix (about 4 hours away) to pick up a load of cacti, leaving home at 4 AM.  Daphne had been acting sick that evening and I ended up getting up with her at 1, 2, 2:45, 3:30 and 4:45.  Normally Burke would take turns helping me out, but I didn't want him to have to get up knowing he would be driving all day.  By the time the 4:45 wake up came, Daphne was having a hard time breathing and I was frightened, knowing Burke was already long gone and couldn't give her a blessing.  She has been sick a couple of times before, but this was the worst I've ever seen her.  She would just lay in my arms, burning up and bawling, doing that deep, lung-rattling cough.  I couldn't get her to eat or drink anything and she couldn't sleep because of the cough.  I felt so helpless, especially with Burke gone.  After a couple of hours I was able to get our neighbor Matt Holt to come over and give her a blessing.  It was such a relief to me to have his help and soon after she was finally able to rest for a few hours.   However, when she woke up she was worse than when she went to sleep.  I called Cassie for advice and then my pediatrician's MA (who is in St. George still).  When she heard Daphne in the background hacking she diagnosed her with croupe and was so incredibly kind to call in a prescription for her.  The craziest thing about all of this was that normally Burke would be 5 minutes away and able to come check on us and help in any way, but of course the one day I felt like I really needed his support he was in the middle of Arizona!  It was an exhausting day.  Thank goodness she is almost back to normal.

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