Moses vs. The Croup

One night a few weeks ago Moses went to bed without eating dinner, then woke up at around 2 AM with a high fever, barking like a seal in between labored gasps for air. Every time he breathed in, his chest became alarmingly concave in. I had never experienced anything like this with the twins, and was honestly pretty scared. It didn't help that I had been up sick for much of the night with a case of food poisoning. Joe and I wondered if we should take him to the ER, but since we're the kind of people who go to the hospital only as a very last resort (especially at 2 AM in the middle of winter), we just held Moses, prayed like we've never prayed before, and coaxed him to take a few licks of a popsicle before he drifted back to sleep.

In the morning Joe called and left a message with our doctor, who later called back, and upon hearing my explanation of Moses' symptoms, determined that he had croup. He first suggested we try a homeopathic phosphorus treatment, but when I described the way Moses had been listlessly laying on the couch all morning with no interest in playing or even watching TV, the doctor urged us to go ahead and take him to urgent care. Moses actually perked up a little on the way to urgent care, because apparently cold air is good for the croup. Once we arrived, Moses was given a nebulizer treatment. At first he resisted and cried, but upon realizing that the nebulizer made him feel better, he relinquished his fight and decided to cooperate. After we'd been at urgent care all afternoon, the doctor decided that we should play it safe and continue on to the hospital for the night.

So we drove home, packed our bags in anticipation of an overnight stay, and dropped the twins off at Mimi and Papa's house. By this point it was about 5 PM and big fat flakes of snow had been showering down steadily all afternoon. Naturally, traffic was a nightmare, and we had to go all the way to Fairfax Hospital since Alexandria doesn't have a pediatric unit. When we finally arrived, Moses settled into his room and enjoyed watching Madagascar from his bed while doctors and nurses gave him steroids, Tylenol, Motrin, another nebulizer treatment, and a popsicle. We were so thankful when they told us we were free to go home that evening at around 9 o'clock. Moses slept soundly that night, and when he woke up the next morning, he ate an entire slice of toast slathered with peanut butter and jam. He normally doesn't even like peanut butter, but his brothers had left this behind at breakfast and I guess Moses was so hungry that he was willing to eat the first thing he could get his hands on. I was so happy to see him eating again that I just sat there and savored watching him savor every bite.

Before this ordeal, I had been totally unfamiliar with croup, thinking it sounded like one of those old-fashioned ailments from the days of yore, but apparently it's quite common among children under age 5. We found out from Granny that both Joe and Uncle Patrick suffered from frequent bouts with the croup when they were little, and the diagnosis paperwork from the urgent care office informed us that croup is an ailment that tends to run in the family. So between this brush with the croup and Moses' episode with the hydrocele when he was a newborn, I guess it's safe to say that Moses did inherit some of his genetic material from his Daddy's side of the family after all! ;-)

Daddy, why did God make your hair fall out?

Overheard in the Wolf household in the past month or so...

Moses, watching me wrap Christmas gifts: "Who's that present for?"
Joe: "It's probably for someone whom Mommy loves very much."
Moses: "Is it for Jesus?"

"Oh my gosh, guys, Caleb probably needs to burp." -Caleb

Joshua, asking about Mr. Popper's Penguins: "Does this movie have people in it?"
Joe: "Yeah."
Joshua: "Then I don't think I will like it. I only like movies that have animals."
Joe: "But this movie has penguins in it."
Joshua: "Are the penguins in Antarctica?"
Joe: "No, I think they're in New York City."
Joshua: "I only like movies about penguins that are in Antarctica."

Joshua: "When I grow up, I will become a man and then I will find a woman to be my wife. Maybe Hana will be my wife. Then Hana will have a baby in her belly and I will be his Daddy and you will be his Mimi and Daddy will be his Babo."

Me: "What did your teachers talk about at school today?"
Caleb: "We talked about Martin Luther King!"
Me: "Oh, wow! Who was Martin Luther King?"
Caleb: "He was brown. I colored his face brown."
Me: "Ok, and what did he do?"
Caleb: "I don't know."
Joshua: "He had really short hair."

Joshua: "I ate lunch with Jory and Keira today."
Caleb: "Jory? I think she looks kind of Korean."
Me: "Yeah, I guess she might be Korean.
Caleb: "Like Mimi and Yoojin and Yejin."
Me: "That's right. You boys are a quarter Korean, you know?"
Joshua: "Does Korean mean our skin is just a little yellow and brown?"

Joe, talking to the twins: "I'll give the iPhone to the first boy who can tell me what 3 plus 3 equals."
Moses: "six!"
Joe: "I guess Moses gets the iPhone."

Me: "Would you want to have another brother?"
Moses: "Yes. I want a baby sister and a baby brother. And then there will be five brothers."
To give you some context, Joe and I had just been talking about large families, and how people we know who come from large families seem to enjoy having many siblings despite the sacrifices their families had to make to accommodate them. So, we asked the boys their opinion on the matter, and this is what Moses said. By "brothers" we are sure that he meant "siblings", a word he is not yet familiar with. Anyway, we are pretty impressed with his quick mental math skills.

Joshua: "Daddy, when did your hair fall out?
Joe: "It started to fall out in college."
Joshua: "But why did God make your hair fall out?"
Joe: "I don't know."
Joshua: "Maybe so that Mommy would think that you looked nice and good."
Joe: "Yeah, it did work, didn't it?"