Category: doctor

Better and Worse

Hopefully Better
So what do yout think about the new template? I hope it loads okay. Sometimes the background graphics on the old one would stall a bit on me which I found annoying. I’m still tinkering with this template a little, but then again I love to tinker. My blogroll disappeared when I switched over for reasons I don’t understand and the info at the bottom of each post is in a tiny font that needs to be changed, etc… But it will get there eventually. (And by then I’ll be sick of this design and want a new one!)

Unfortunately Worse
On the rash front, it’s been looking worse since I posted those pictures of him. So yesterday I took him to the doctor. We’ve been there so many times that I know the nurse by name (Hi, Melissa!) Anyway, E. has (drumroll please)…impetigo! It probably started as a rash from his drooling/penicillin allergy but now it’s infected. So he has to be on oral antibiotics again, which I was a little upset about. I just feel badly that he’s been on antibiotics almost every month. I asked the doctor if a topical antibiotic would work, and he said that it wouldn’t be very effective. So now E.’s on cefinir. When I picked up the prescription, the pharmacist told me that cefinir is 8% related to penicillin and so to watch E. for an allergic reaction. Isn’t there some antibiotic that is 0% related to penicillin that they could prescribed?

I whine a lot, but I know that many many kids have much more serious health problems. I’m very grateful that in general E. is a very healthy baby. But with all that said, these minor things one after another wear me out a little.

Who has two thumbs…

…and is allergic to penicillin?

–This guy!

Yes sir, the hits just keep on coming. A while ago E. picked up a strep infection on his skin (I think he actually got it from his 4-month visit to the pediatrician) and so a week ago the doctor put him on amoxicillin to clear it up. It worked, but his stomach was very upset and then today he broke out in hives all over his chest, arms, and legs.

I took him back to the doctor today and they said that he’s allergic to penicillin. So now he’s off of the amoxicillian and he’s taking Children’s Benadryl to clear up the hives. I don’t like giving him so much medicine when he’s so little, but it seems necessary in this case.

I think that E. has suffered more than his fair share of aliments this winter. I know that kids get sick a lot, but come on! He’s really been a trooper throughout it all, though. Poor sweet little guy.

E. at 4 Months

E. had his 4-month checkup yesterday. He looks so bleary eyed in the photo because he fell asleep in his carseat and only woke up when I had to undress him for his exam. I was right about his size – he weighed just under 17 pounds at 16 lbs 14 oz. and he was 25 and 3/4 inches long. The doctor said that he’s developing nicely and that I should start him on baby cereal sometime in the next 2 months. E. got another round of shots. I took him home and he continued the nap he had started in the car for a couple of hours. His reaction to the shots seemed to be okay, but last night he was crying and waking up every couple of hours and running a low grade fever. I was so tired of getting up out of bed to soothe him back to sleep every other hour or so that around 5am I gave him and put him to sleep in his swing and I crashed on the couch. It worked – he didn’t wake up again until 9:30am.

The odd sleep I got last night left me both tired from waking up so often and also a little oogey from sleeping in so long–the worst of both worlds. It might be the rough night, but I feel really overwhelmed by things today. I’m behind on some things I need to do for work, the house is a mess, I need to go grocery shopping, and there’s a long list of home improvement projects that I need to get started on. But all I want to do is veg on the couch and was Jeeves and Wooster on DVD. Here’s hoping the weekend’s both productive AND relaxing. A tall order, I know, but a girl can dream.

Have a good weekend!

Hanging In There


I took E. to the doctor again yesterday (5 visits in 2 weeks, a new personal best! Hopefully this record will stand for a long time.) Anyway, it turns out that the poor little guy has RSV. He has a cough and is a little wheezy, but the oxygen levels in his blood tested okay, so for right now it’s not super serious. I’m still kind of freaked out though because I know his condition can turn pretty quickly. So I’m watching him like a hawk to see if his breathing becomes more labored. The next week or so might be a little rough.

Oh yeah, and he has a double ear infection that he started antibiotics for. And he hates taking the antibiotic and squirms around and gets it everywhere.

Sigh. The good times just keep on coming.

E.’s First Fever

Yesterday I noticed the E. didn’t seem like his normal cheerful self and in the early evening he started to feel pretty warm. I took his temperature and it was 101 and some degrees, and so N. and I took made an appointment with our pediatrician’s after hours clinc. There his temperature was a little over 102, and because he’s so little still they wanted to run some urine and possibly blood tests to find out why.

Here’s the part I’m really ashamed of: when they were going to insert the catheter, they wanted me to sit by him and hold his arms and try and keep him calm. And I just lost it and started crying. I just felt so bad that E. was feeling so awful. He had been whimpering almost constantly for a couple of hours and it was obvious that he was miserable. And the whole catheter thing was freaking me out. E.’s so little! So N. held him. It was pretty bad because E. had just wet his diaper and so they had to stick the catheter way up there to get any pee at all. Of course E. totally freaked out. I still feel bad that I wimped out. I should have been there for him.

After they looked at his urine, they wanted to look at his blood so they sent us over to the hospital to get it drawn. It was now after 9pm and the outpatient lab was closed, so we had to wait in the emergency room for someone to draw it there. We were there for almost an hour before someone could be spared to do it. This time I did better though. I was collected enough to hold him down as they put the little tourniquet on his tiny arm and drew the blood. Argh! The whole thing was so sad.

So after that and around 10pm we were back over the clinic. They close at 10 but were waiting to get E.’s blood results and for us. It turned out that the type of red blood cells that the body releases from bone marrow when it’s fighting an infection were elevated. After talking with the doctor it was decided to give E. a one-time shot of antibiotics. So I had to hold him down again for that. Good times!

We got home a little after 10:30pm. I massaged E.’s thigh where he got his shot (he screamed bloody murder, of course) and gave him some baby Tylenol like the doctor said to and put him to bed. He fussed for a little while and then feel asleep, exhausted. He woke up screaming around 4am this morning and I jumped out of bed in a panic and ran across the hallway to his room, running smack into the door in the process. (I’m so unused to him screaming that it really kind of freaks me out.) But he’s now sleeping in his swing.

*sigh* I am so wiped out! We have a follow up appointment for E. this afternoon. Hopefully we’ll find out that the antibiotic has helped.

Anyway, here are some of E. with his cousins Big E. and Little E. who were visiting this weekend. It was really fun to see them and N.’s sister G. and her husband.

G., who is pregnant, had a craving for chajangmyun (Korean black bean paste noodles) and radish kimchi. Both sounded good to me and so we made some noodles and got out the kimchi. As G. and I were eating, Little E. declared that she wanted some noodles. So G. gave her a taste. And Little E. declared that she wanted more noodles! She ended up eating almost a third of the bowl. I think G. was torn was between annoyance at having to share so many of her noodles and pride that her daughter was eating Korean food; the pride definitely won out. Little E. also wanted to try the kimchi, but that didn’t go over as well!


E. at Two Months

E. had his 8-week checkup yesterday. He’s doing well and has turned into quite a big little guy. He weighs 16 and a half lbs. and is 24 and a half inches long, putting him in the 97 percentiles for weight and height. He smiles and likes to “talk” to people and is generally very pleasant.


He also got his first round of shots: two in each leg. It took him a second after the nurse injected the first shot to register the pain, but then he turned beet red and screamed his head off. It was pretty sad. He quieted down as soon as I picked him up and cuddled him though, which was kind of touching and a little flattering.

At the doctor’s, before the shots.

At home, after the shots.


He’s still feeling a little fussy and feverish today. Poor little guy.