The chocolate sauce very likely will not happen today. My husband called yesterday shortly after I finished posting that the ingredients were measured and ready to go. He was on his way to the ER, unable to breathe. Would I mind terribly meeting him there? Would I mind? Oh, for the love of God, no. It was close to school pick up time so I put the baby into the car, drove first to get the Boy Wonder and headed over. I was convinced that he would have been called in by the time I got there - aren't breathing problems a ticket to instant ER service, along with chest pain and premature labor? No go. I rushed in after finding what had to be the farthest possible parking spot to find him sitting in the waiting area turning ever so slightly bluish around the edges.


I have always known that this could someday happen. My husband has asthma that has been difficult to control - although a series of excellent allergists and pulmonary specialists have kept him on an even keel for a while now. He hadn't been serious about keeping his meds up to date until I came home from work one day crying and shaking after a colleague's sudden death from...asthma. He had an asthma attack and died, leaving behind a pregnant wife and an 18 month old son. I had had no idea that people could die of asthma in this day and age - never once occurred to me. I thought that was something that used to happen. We had just begun the negotiations surrounding starting a family and I told him that we would not be having children until he started taking regular appointments and got his medications in order. He now says that he knew from my tone of my voice and the cast of my face that I meant it and so he made the necessary calls the next day.


That was early in 1999. Since then he has kept up with a regimen of two or three inhalers, plus allergy tabs and nasal sprays. And it all worked - until yesterday. Likely the event was set off by the cold we're wrestling with, coupled with the normal allergens one sees in the advent of spring and the stress of mid-semester exams (not to mention the general rundownedness that comes from living with an infant). In any case, he was stabilized and sent home more than 6 hours after his arrival (he was only taken "backstage" to keep me from bothering the triage nurse again with requests for a nebulizer, towel and/or a basin for vomiting).


Today we're all tired and a little spent from the drama. The hospital is no place for kids, but since the only people we know here in Cville work at the hospital we had no one to look after them for us. The Boy Wonder was just that - amazing how kids know they've got to pull it together and just not be, you know, toddlers. The baby slept off her schedule and even consented to nurse with lots of light and noise - conditions at which she usually balks. The parts of the day not spent sleeping will be used to pick up prescriptions, track down the allergist and talking to the radiologist about the chest x-ray. Today I also get to admit to how scared I was and maybe even cry a little.