The ER trip that didn't need to happen

My oldest was 10 months old.

It was a Saturday night. 9:30pm. He threw up.

Okay. Babies throw up. No big deal.

Then he threw up again.

And again.

And my husband and I just looked at each other like… what do we do right now?

We did what every new parent does. We Googled.

And Google did what Google does. It terrified us.

"Watch for signs of dehydration."

"Monitor for lethargy and dazed behavior."

"Seek medical attention if vomiting persists."

But like… we don't want to wait until he's lethargic and dazed to figure out our next step.

He's 10 months old. He can't tell us how he feels. He's just a baby who keeps throwing up and we're two first-time parents standing in the nursery at 10pm on a Saturday with no idea what's normal and what's not.

So we called our pediatrician's after-hours line.

Nobody picked up.

We tried again. Nothing.

At that point, we didn't know what else to do. He was starting to dry heave and we were done guessing.

So we packed him up and drove to an urgent care.

They took one look at him and said, "We don't see patients this young. You need to go to the ER."

Cool. So now it's almost 11pm, we're loading a sick baby back into the car seat, and driving to the emergency room.

They were kind. I want to say that.

But honestly? They didn't do much.

They watched him. Gave him some Pedialyte. Waited for the vomiting to slow down.

Wrote us a prescription for something to settle his stomach if it happened again.

And sent us home.

The whole thing took hours. The bill was… I don't even want to talk about it.

Let me just say that ER Pedialyte hits different when you see what they charge for it. 😅

And looking back, I'm not mad we went. We were new parents and we made the safest call we could with the information we had.

But I keep thinking: what if we could have just talked to someone?

Not Googled. Not called a line that didn't answer. Not driven to two different places in the middle of the night with a sick baby.

Just… picked up the phone and talked to an actual pediatrician who could tell us what was normal, what to watch for, and whether we actually needed to leave the house.

That's the part I wish we'd had.

After that night, I started looking for a better backup plan. Something for the next time it's 10pm and I don't know if this is an "it'll pass" situation or an "act now" situation.

That's when I found Blueberry Pediatrics.

It's basically a membership that gives you 24/7 access to board-certified pediatricians. Not a nurse line. Not a chatbot. Actual pediatricians you can text, call, or video chat with at any hour, any day, including weekends and holidays.

When I tell you this would have changed that entire Saturday night, I mean it.

We could have messaged a pediatrician from our living room at 9:45pm. Described what was happening. Gotten a real answer about whether it was a "ride it out with small sips of Pedialyte" situation or a "go in now" situation.

No urgent care that turned us away. No ER. No $800 bill for what ended up being a normal stomach bug.

See how Blueberry works →

I love our pediatrician. This isn't about replacing them.

But here's the reality of that after-hours line:

Sometimes nobody answers. Sometimes it's a nurse (not a doctor) reading from a script.

Sometimes the callback takes 45 minutes and by then you've already panicked and loaded everyone into the car.

Blueberry is different because it's your dedicated team of pediatricians.

They get to know your kids. They follow up within 24 hours. And they respond within minutes, not "sometime tonight."

They can also prescribe medication and send it straight to your pharmacy.

So if your kid needs something at 11pm, you're not waiting until Monday morning for your regular doctor to open.

When you sign up, they send you an at-home medical kit with a thermometer, a pulse oximeter (the little finger clip that reads oxygen levels), and a wifi ear scope.

That ear scope is a game changer. You can record video of your kid's ear and send it directly to the pediatrician. They can diagnose an ear infection from your couch.

Think about how many times you've dragged a miserable kid to the doctor just to confirm "yep, it's an ear infection, here's amoxicillin." Now imagine doing that from your living room in pajamas.

They say they can treat 9 out of 10 common childhood illnesses without you leaving the house.

After using it, I believe it.

This is for you if:

You've ever been stuck at night not knowing if something is "ER worthy" or not.

You've called your pediatrician's after-hours line and gotten voicemail.

You have little ones in daycare who bring home every virus known to science. 😅

You want a real pediatrician available on weekends, holidays, and 2am without an ER bill.

This is NOT for you if:

You already have reliable 24/7 access to your pediatrician and you're happy with it. (If that's your situation, genuinely, keep it.)

Your child needs emergency care (broken bones, breathing emergencies, serious injuries). Blueberry is not an ER replacement for true emergencies. It's for everything else.

One membership covers ALL of your kids. No copays. No per-visit fees. No matter how many times you use it.

It's $18 a month. Or less if you do the annual plan.

For context: our ER Pedialyte alone was more than several years of Blueberry combined.

I'm still not over it. 😅

That's actually the best time to set it up.

Because you don’t want to be creating accounts at 10pm with a vomiting baby.

Get it set up. Put the kit in a cabinet.

And the next time something happens at 9:30 on a Saturday night, you'll pick up your phone instead of your car keys.