Hand, Foot, and Mouth

 

For once, that phrase doesn’t apply to some ghastly behavior by me at a party.   We’re just back from the doctor, and Conor is napping.  He apparently has hand, foot and mouth disease.  YIKES!!!

 

It sounds a lot worse than it actually is, but it sounds absolutely horrible.  And we’re really looking forward to what we can expect over the next 6 to 9 days—painful, blistery sores in Conor’s mouth and on his hands and hands, and perhaps even on his booty.  His fever is likely to continue up to 5 days with “spikes” similar to last night’s approximately 105.  (Just typing that makes me start crying) 

 

Last night was horrible.  Last night scared the absolute crap out of me.  Conor had been running a little fever yesterday afternoon and was uncharacteristically cranky, tired and wouldn’t eat.  He went to bed early and around 9 pm woke up with a 100.7 under the arm temp.  (We only do under the arm; Sears says that after 3 months it’s ok to do under the arm as a way of getting a general idea of the temperature.  The one thing that makes it difficult is that under the arm is somewhere between 1 to 2 degrees lower than rectal)  I usually just add on 2 degrees and assume that is the “worst case scenario” for his fever.  And yes, I have tested and when he’s well, he runs about 96 something under his arm. 

 

So at 9 pm, we’re thinking he could be running 102.7.  We give him some Tylenol and decide to take him to the big bed so we can watch over him.  He’s had a fever this high before and generally there has not been too much of a problem.  But I’d rather have him near me than in the crib in case something happens. 

 

About 1:30 am, Dave wakes me up and says he thinks we ought to give Conor some more Tylenol.  “Good idea,” I think, “the other dose has run out and while I’m bfing him, I’ll just check his underarm temp again.”  When the digital thermometer shot up to 102 right off the bat, I freaked.  When it kept climbing closer and closer to 103 (again, that’s underarm, that’s likely to be 105 rectal), I began to get Really. Freaked. Out.

 

“Dave!  Get the Dr. Sears book!  Quick!  Read the part about when to freak the hell out over a fever.  DAVE!!!  CALL THE DOCTOR!!!  It’s going over 103!”  Yes, I don’t know whether it stopped at 103.1 or whether I couldn’t stand it any more because I didn’t hear the beep.  All I know is that Dave found the part in the Sears book about reducing a fever over 104 with a tepid bath after giving Tylenol.  And we left a message for a nurse at our ped’s office.  I was truly losing it because I couldn’t remember whether it is 105 or 107 where brain damage occurs from a fever.  (I found this morning that it is 107, and yes, that would have eased my mind tremendously to have known that)

 

We left him in the bath for 10 minutes.  We should have left him there for 20, but it’s hard to read and act in a crisis feeling moment.  By the time he was diapered and back on the boob, his temp was down to an underarm temp of 101.5.   By the time we were back in the big bed, it was down to pit temp 100.5.  Typing that sentence makes me sigh again as loudly as I did last night. 

 

The fever in and of itself is not a problem.  What really had my panties in wad was that he was so upset.  He was crying when we just lifted him up in our arms.  When he was nursing in the big bed, he was staring up at me with his brows furrowed.  When Dave came into the room, it was the only time he smiled.  (This coming from a baby who will crack himself up while nursing)

 

So although we now know that he has this very contagious disease which is very common in daycares and pre-schools, there is not much we can do.  His fever is likely to continue for 2 to 3 more days with additional spikes like last night.  (Thank GOD I went to the doctor today because my head would explode tonight if I didn’t know what was going on)  Conor’s throat is only starting to hurt now and it’s going to get much, much worse.  I bought some fruit pops and ice cream for him.  I might try to make a smoothie and see if he will drink it later on.

 

Again, scary, scary, scary and it’s not even a dangerous disease.  It’s just going to suck for him for the next week until everything clears up.  My heart can only go so far in imagining how tough it must be for families when something really bad happens. 

1:38:37 PM     trackback [] Comments? []

WOOHOO!!! 

I think we're back up and running....and all I did was just copy the entire set of files from one of my 4 (!) backups of my blog onto the "new" computer/operating system.  I've lost *two* of my old posts, but I don't give a hoo ha.  It seems we're back to blogging.

Just in time for me to compose a post about the 105 degree fever Conor started running last night and our middle of the night freak-out tepid bath to get that fever down. 

Hopefully, everything is going to keep running on this blog.....A public and HUMONGOUS thanks to Rhye, the one "real" person I know who knows anything about radioland who took a good deal of her time out of her weekend to help incompetent me. 

9:27:59 AM     trackback [] Comments? []
Testing
9:23:44 AM     trackback [] Comments? []