Tuesday, March 30, 2010

10 days is a long time

Over the weekend we had quite the ordeal. Friday night late, after picking James and Audrey up from a friends house, Jon found a few red bumps on Audrey's abdomen. After we each examined them and looked at a few pictures on the Internet of like red bumps, we both thought it was Chicken Pox. I gave her some Benadryl and Tylenol and put her to bed. She slept soundly but when I got her up the next morning, the red bumps had spread. We still thought it was Chicken Pox, even though it was strange for her to get them since she hadn't been exposed (that we knew of) and she has had the vaccination. But I knew it possible for a child to be vaccinated and still get them, small possibility, but still possible. Besides, it looked like pox and acted like pox.
So through out the day Saturday, I treated her like she had Chicken Pox. She got oatmeal baths every 3 hours, benadryl every 6 hours and Calamine lotion when ever she started scratching. As a whole, she handled the itchy, red bumps very well. She would have moments of laughing and playing and running around like she didn't have a horrible red rash covering her teeny, tiny body. Some of the red bumps appeared to be blistering over so that was just more conformation that it was Chicken Pox. Even still, I wasn't totally satisfied with that answer. I kept looking up rashes (and can probably identify all the rashes out there now!) but couldn't find anything that looked like what she had, except for Chicken Pox. Well, and the hives but even still the bumps weren't raised like hives. Before I put her to bed, the bumps had yet to really blister over and they looked slightly different then when they had started. By the time I went to bed, I was sure it wasn't Chicken Pox but I still didn't know what in the world it could be. I had thought of an allergic reaction and had racked my brain as to anything new she had eaten or been exposed to and could think of nothing. She had been on Amoxicillin for the past 10 days for an ear infection and I had thought about that several times but kept coming back to the fact that she had been on it for 10 whole days with out any type of reaction. I just didn't think it possible to be on something for that long and not have an adverse reaction until the medicine was finished. Well, I was wrong. Never underestimate the power of medicine!

Saturday night was probably the worst night Audrey and I have ever gone through together. She woke up about 11:00 and was wriggling with discomfort. I put her in the bed with me because you know, getting in the bed with mama seems to cure most night time troubles for kids! But not this time, she continued to toss and turn and itch and scratch. So, I got up and tried to give her a oatmeal bath. She screamed the whole time so I took her out and didn't even try to coat her in Calamine. I just wrapped her in a towel and we sat on the toilet until she calmed down. We got back in the bed and for what seemed like an eternity we layed there, her on top of me and me singing Amazing Grace. Me singing and sometimes rocking was the only thing that seemed to help her fight the urge to scratch and be some what comfortable. By about 3 a.m. I knew I couldn't go on this way so we piled up on the couch and watched Tom and Jerry until we both fell asleep. She eventually woke me up though, scratching herself in her sleep.

First thing the Sunday morning I took her to an urgent care and the doctor there said it was definitely a drug rash. She wrote her a scrip for a steroid and told me to follow up with our pediatrician Monday morning. As soon as Peach got a dose of the steroid in her, she started acting like she felt better and a couple hours later almost all of the redness was gone. The bumps were/are still there but the redness wasn't/isn't.

Monday morning I took her in to see our regular doctor and as soon as she walked in the room, she asked had Audrey been on any medication and when I told her Amoxicillin, she rambled out some weird name as a diagnosis and said we needed to make sure Audrey never takes Penicillin again. No kidding! The weird name she rambled out was Erythema multiforme (minor), hence the different forms the rash took on over the 36 hour period she suffered. When I asked Dr. K to write down the name of the rash she said "You know you can go home and freak your self out on the internet!" I laughed and said I sure did know that and not to worry, I would take her at her word that Audrey was fine and was going to be fine! This rash can take a long time to go away and Audrey still has to take Benadryl every 6 hours, I even have to wake up in the middle of the night and give her a dose because if she misses a dose by even 45 minutes she starts itching again. She will most likely have to continue this for 48 hours, maybe more. And the steroid, well, our ped didn't think the dose that the urgent care doctor had written was enough so, she wrote her a new scrip with stronger, more frequent doses. Oh joy. Let's just say that Audrey on 3 mls, twice a day of a steroid, is 1 million times worse than James on albuterol every 2 hours and I will probably be able to dedicate an entire blog post to "Audrey on prednisolone for 9 whole days"!!!!!!

All's well that ends well, that's what they say. We are just so thankful to the good Lord for watching over our little girl. So thankful that even if I didn't have the sense enough to have her seen by a doctor right away, at least I did have sense enough to give her Benadryl, you know for the Chicken Pox! And at least this time, when one of my children broke out in some kind of rash, I didn't dress her in the thickest, warmest pajamies I could find! (remember James had an allergic reaction to Pinicillin two years ago and I kept dressing him in thick jammies so he wouldn't catch a cold out in the Country!) The doctor at the urgent care told me her tongue was slightly swollen so I shudder to think what would have happened had she not been taking Benadryl. I am so thankful we serve such a merciful God.

6 comments:

Becky said...

Oh Peach! I can't stand how pitiful you are!

Dianne said...

Bless her precious little heart! I sort'a relate, 'manda, with my GRANDson, Jackson. But, his is allergies to food and he breaks out like that and he claws his bumps in his sleep. Makes ME crazy, too. I can comfortably feed him potatoes (french fries) and bacon. That's it. And, fruit snacks. EVERYthing else causes him to break out in such horrid rashes. I'm SO glad you found Audrey's "culprit" and she'll never be "exposed" again. I think you're one of the most "on it" Mama's I know. And, I LOVE that you do everything humanly possible to make these "babies" comfortable when they're under the weather. Amazing Grace is amazing.

Sydney Sanders said...

So pitiful but so adorable!

Sam and Nelda said...

Bless her little heart! Thank goodness for benedryl!

su said...

Thanks for sharing such a detailed account- you are truly gifted with that talent- and it helps us grandparents so far away. So glad the hard time is over! For both of you.

Amanda said...

Sometimes I feel like I am way to detailed in my accounts but that is how my mind works, just ask my poor husband! So, glad you enjoy the details.