Bad things happen in 3's

1. Abigail in the hospital. (She was released Fri. morning after 11 days)
2. Natasha in the hospital.
3. Andrew. Wed. night as we were at the grocery store stocking up for grandpa's visit later that evening, Andrew started to tremble. I thought he was having a seizure but he was still standing. His face went white and his nose & mouth turned purple. I knew he was still breathing but I was terrified. We drove recklessly to the nearest hospital (ironically it's not where the twins were) and checked him into the ER. He had acted just fine until the incident, and now he was listless, running a 102 degree fever and working hard to breathe (it's called grunting or retracting). I thought it was RSV and the chest x-ray showed a viral upper resp. infection but the simple RSV test said negative. The next day we went to the doctor like we were told to and he said to watch him. Friday afternoon my dad was with Natasha so I decided to lay down with Andrew for a nap. He started retracting and struggling to breathe again. I could hear the strain and called my pediatrician. He and my mother-in-law (she is an ER doctor) strongly suggested the ER. This time we went to the same hospital as the girls. 4 hours and 3 breathing treatments later they diagnosed him with RAD--respiratory airway disease. He is highly prone to asthma later in life and very susceptible now to any resp. illness. Luckily they gave us breathing treatments and his breathing settles down often during the day. Thankfully, his cough is calming as well. We can only hope this recent rash of dramas will end with 3. I am embarrassed that many of the ER staff members recognized me and asked about the girls. 4 ER visits in 11 days is enough drama for me.

On the plus side, Natasha is weaning from oxygen much faster than her sister. It's probably due to the fact that she never had and big crashes or ICU time. Also, a medical student researched and actually found accurate medical statistics on our girls. In the US there are only 10-15 documented cases of identical twins with DS each year. I have been searching for statistics with actual REAL numbers for 9 months. Happy Happy Happy!