Blue suckers causing blue lips - mimicking asthma warning sign!

What do blue suckers have to do with asthma?

What do they have to do with asthma? Well.......there are certain things that only another asthma mom would understand!

My Sweet Friend has a nursing background and has several kids with asthma.  

She sent me this text the other day:

"Lesson for me! Don't give your sick asthma child a blue sucker. I just went to wake my daughter up from her nap and nearly had a heart attack at seeing her blue lips!"

"Earlier that day, we had stopped to see my mom and she gave my daughter a sucker. I went straight home and put my daughter down for a nap. She was recovering from pneumonia, so when I checked on her and she had blue lips, my heart stopped and all of my training kicked in. All that education forced me to calm down and start assessing her. When I realized she was breathing perfectly fine, only then did I remember the blue sucker from earlier!"

 

Talk about panic!! The one thing you NEVER want to see is a child with asthma that has blue lips.

For asthma, Webmd lists when to call 911:

• Severe wheezing when breathing both in and out
• Coughing that won't stop
• Very rapid breathing
• Chest tightness or pressure
• Tightened neck and chest muscles, called retractions
• Difficulty talking
• Feelings of anxiety or panic
• Pale, sweaty face
• Blue lips or fingernails
• Or worsening symptoms despite use of your medications

Call 911 if you have any of these symptoms.

It's probably my fault that Sweet Friend panicked. My kids were hospitalized a LOT for asthma when they were younger (12 hospitalizations.) She heard all of the stories about their hospitalizations. In fact, Son #2 ended up in ICU twice - with blue lips (that shows that there is a dangerously low oxygen level.)

When my kids would get sick, I would always call Sweet Friend in a panic. She has a gift for listening to lungs with a stethoscope. She could hear crackling (pneumonia), balloons rubbing together sound (bronchitis), and reduced air movement. She would tell me which lung it was in (left or right) and upper or lower lobe. 

Sometimes I wasn't sure whether I should take my child to the doctor or not. I would call Sweet Friend and beg her to come over with her stethoscope. When she would hear something bad, I would head to the doctor. More than once, the doctor would say, "they sound fine." I would say, "Hmmmm....my friend is a nurse and she heard reduced air flow in the lower left lobe." The doctor would listen again, and low and behold! He would hear the same thing.

Then he would start oral steroids, give the kids a shot of steroids, or send us to the hospital so our child could be admitted for asthma.

So, blue lips can be a VERY dangerous symptom of an asthma emergency. 

Or....... it can be from a blue sucker!

Only another asthma mom would understand.

(Note to self: don't buy any more blue suckers - buy the other colors instead!)