Panicked!

A fortnight ago, I had the greatest scare of my life.

My 3rd child, Jaq, had developed a fever due to teething. His fever was not that high, only about 38 or so. Nevertheless, I gave him some Tylenol, but I did not administer the medicine as prescribed (every 4 hours). The last dose I gave was around 11pm.

During the night, I heard him giggling in his sleep. "Probably just dreaming", I thought. Then at about 5am, he woke up. He still got a slight fever so I let him sleep beside me in our bed (he still sleeps in his crib). Shortly thereafter, it happened.

I felt the bed shook and I thought that he was giggling in his sleep again. When I turned to look, his whole body was twitching violently, his eyes were rolling ... goodness me! he was having a seizure.

Then, I did the most STUPID thing to do in case of an emergency ... I panicked! I picked up my son and screamed "Call 911, call 911" to my friend who was sleeping in the other room. For what seemed like eternity, my son shook heavily in my arms. Then, he went limp. I swear I thought he had died in my arms, and my heart just stopped beating. I just stood there helplessly cradling my child, calling out his name over and over.

He regained consciousness a little while later; paramedics came, and off we went to the Emergency; my hubby followed (soon as he arrived from his graveyard shift); all blood tests turned out ok, and there seemed to be no cause of panic ... "just a febrille seizure", doctor said. Normal occurence in 1:25 kids.

Still, it was the most frightening thing that ever happened to me. I realized that I am no superMom after all. With 4 kids, I should have been more experienced, but I wasn't. Should have known better, but I didn't; I felt so ill-equipped with the usual know-hows of a mom. I felt so terrible.