Donde esta el hospital?

Hi all:-) I hope everyone is somehow getting along without me...I know it can be hard! Not to make you too jealous, but I am sitting on a second-story porch, bare feet up on another chair, sipping a lunchtime margarita and eating a bowl of fresh fruit that is incredibly delicious. It is about 80 degrees, bright and sunny with a delightful breeze coming off the ocean. I can see Smoking Hot Roommate, Big Sis, The Boy's sister, her wife, and two of the girls are sitting on the beach. The Boy and The Rocket Scientist appear to be out on the jet skis. I have a feeling heaven is like this.

That's the good news...the bad? Ever been in a Mexican hospital? I have...and that's something I couldn't say at this time yesterday. But I was there all night, didn't get back to bed until about 7am and just woke up a little while ago.

One of Munchkin's friends had a really bad asthma attack. She has an inhaler, but I think the girls kind of overdid it yesterday, and maybe the change in air contributed, too, but she woke up in the middle of the night wheezing and coughing and couldn't breathe well. Needless to say, that was kinda scary.

The good news is that there is a doctor in the house (Big Sis' aptly named fiance, The Brain Surgeon) so I wasn't totally panicking. I have no idea what I would have done otherwise. But he took one look at the situation and surmised that she needed to get to a hospital, so he and I took her sometime around 1:00 or so. Also, good thing he speaks pretty good Spanish and can drive in Mexico and managed to find the way to the hospital...

I called the girl's parents (the two people we were skiing with a couple weeks ago) and they were remarkably calm about the whole thing. Obviously they were scared, but they managed to remain pretty composed and settled their daughter down a bit...part of the problem was that she was panicking at the same time. Again, they may have reached a whole different level of apoplepsia if The Brain Surgeon wasn't around.

So we got to the hospital, which was not at all as scary as I had imagined it might be. The emergency doctor that was there seemed pretty competent and the place was clean and pretty well maintained. The Brain Surgeon called his hospital in Boston to talk to the emergency pediatrics doctor that was on call, and the Mexican doctor didn't get at all snippy about talking to the American doctor to make everyone feel better. The American pediatrics doctor basically said "Yes, this doctor knows what he is doing and has it under control," which was very good to hear.

She needed some kind of a shot and a special kind of inhalation thing. She felt better almost immediately, and after an hour on the breathing thing, she was pretty much all better. They kept her there for a bit to be safe, during which time she fell asleep (which is a good sign) and at about 5:30 we left to go back to the house. I called the girl's parents on the way to let them know, and everyone kind of woke up when we got back home. I was kinda wound up, so it took me a while to fall asleep...which was just about when the sun came up.

So, that was the excitement for the night. The little girl woke up about 10 minutes ago, and I am happy to report that she is pretty much back to 100% and scoffed at the idea that she might want to cut her trip short and go back home early. She has some new medicine that she is supposed to take before she goes to bed just to be safe, and hopefully all will go well the rest of the time. The Brain Surgeon is still sleeping, but he gets mega-super-mad props for making everything all better:-)

Other than that, things are pretty fucking peachy. We had no trouble taking off on time Saturday morning, despite the storm. The house is absolutely gorgeous and I never wanna go back! It is in kind of a subdivision type area with some other houses nearby (but not too close!) and there are some other kids around for the girls to play with on the beach.

We met some of the neighbors during a little cookout last night, and basically have just bummed around on the beach for a couple days. That is sort of the plan for the rest of the week, too. Later this week we are going to try and go down the coast to a place called Xel-ha, which is supposed to be a super fun water-park kind of place with snorkeling and things. It is an "ecological water theme park." Has anyone ever been? And there is some thought that we should drive inland and see Chichen-itza. Anyone ever been there?

So that is about it. I have a couple of work emails to return, and then I am gonna go and spend a beautiful afternoon on the beach:-D Wish me luck!!!