Making History...

This past weekend we went to Phoenix for a gorgeous little girls batptism that I will post about later. While we were in the valley saturday mid morning Hunter started complaining that his ear tickled. By that afternoon he was close to tears telling me how much his ear hurt. Being he had been a little emotional all day, he had stayed up late the previous three nights and we had to wake the kids up at 5:30 that morning to get to the baptism on time, I talked it up to being his ears needed to pop and being overly tired. I went ahead gave him some Motrin and immediately he was off running around with his cousins. He's really sick right! So all the way home he was moaning and complaining how his ear tickled/hurt. I was having him do everything I could think of to get his ears to pop. I was having him yawn, chew gum, gave him a cup with a straw to suck on hoping that would help. He said he had little pops but still his ear hurt. By the time we got home he was in tears. Being it was late and all the doctors offices were closed I sent Hunter to bed with more Motrin and the promise of taking him to the Dr.'s in the morning if his ear still hurt. Morning couldn't come soon enough. He was up numerous times due to his ear. Being it was sunday he and I went to the nearest Urgent Care. The office opened at 9:00 am and we signed it at 8:55, with 4 patiens ahead of us. Why it took 3 incredibly long hours for us to be seen with only the 4 patients and us in the waiting room I will never understand. The doctor looked in Hunter's ears and accusingly asked me when Hunter started complaing about an ear ache. Yesterday, I answered. Hunter ended up having an infection in his ear canal and in his ear drum. The doctor let me know that his ear was quite red, swollen and angry. His ear looked like he had had an infectin for a few days now. He told me how lucky we were that his ear drum didn't rupture on our trip home. So Hunter is on a RX 3 times a day for 10 days along with ear drops 4x a day for 7 days.

Starting sunday afternoon Little Miss started complaining that her ears hurt. I figured she was a little jealous of the attention big brother was having. She would complain and then run off to play. Sunday before bed she had a slight fever and was still complaining that her ear hurt. I told her that if her ear still hurt in the morning that I would take her to the doctor too. She then told me how she hates going to the doctor so her ear won't be hurting by morning. Once again Kory and I were up with both Emily and Brayden several times through the night. Brayden still has a cold and is quite stuffy. He just can't breathe well or starts coughing horribly when we lay him down. So come monday morning Emily still claims she doesn't feel good but her ear doesn't hurt. She said her throat didn't hurt, her arms and legs didn't hurt, nothing hurt she just didn't feel good but she still had a fever.

When Emily woke up from her nap later that day she still have a fever and her body was now covered with a red rash underneath her clothes. She said she didn't feel good but was up and playing with her siblings just fine. She seemed fine. Tuesday Emily's rash was now all over her body. It was in her ears, all over her neck on the tops of her feet, just everywhere. By bedtime she was complaining that she itched all over. We kept slathering her little body with lotion which seemed to help. She still had a fever but still claimed that nothing hurt. Maddie once got a rash with a high fever and when I took her to the doctors I was told the side effect of the fever was the rash, there was nothing to do for it. Not wanting to go to the doctors just to be sent home to ride this thing out I kept her doctored up with many popsicles, Motrin and Tylenol. Tuesday night she was up most of the night whimpering how she didn't feel very good and itched like crazy.

The best way to describe her skin tuesday night was that it wasn't really a rash anymore but she was now covered in goose bumps. As long as she was high on drugs you could see the bumps but they weren't bothersome. When the tylenol was wearing off the bumps turned red and started to itch again.

Being she still had a fever, the itchy rash, not wanting to eat and by now being quite tempermental and lathargic I took her to the doctors. The nurse came in took her temp it was again back up to 102. When I asked her about the rash she said it was probably a side effect from the high fever. After the bazillion questions that I was asked the nurse said that Strep was going around and so wanted to go ahead and swab her throat even though she wasn't complaining about a sore throat. The nurse left to do the in office test and came back a few minutes later. The nurse said,"Well I have an answer for you now about the rash. Emily has "SCARLET FEVER". Seriously!!!!! The Scarlet Fever is the same strain as strep throat only it also comes with a body rash. As you can imagine the Scarlet Fever is very rare but still happens. Emily made history today as being the 1st patient to be treated for Scarlet Fever in this paticular doctors office. The doctor had seen this only once before when she was an intern. Many of the nures kept coming in to see their first "Scarlet Fever" patient. Emily is being treated the same way as if she just had strep. She's on RX 2x a day for 10 days.

Since we had so much attention at the doctors office everyone could hear how congested and what a horrible cough Brayden had. Since strep throat is so contagious the doctor had Brayden tested as a percaution. Can you believe it came back positive. Brayden made history of being the youngest to be treated for Strep. He to is on a RX 2x a day for 10 days now. Since Hunter is already on an RX he should be O.K. I'm a little worried about Madelyn, being she sleeps next to her sister. So far she's good. No fever and no complaining she's not feeling well. If she gets this I hope it will show its signs today or tommorrow so we don't have to do another Urgent Care on the weekend. The office was thrilled to see the history we were making. I just wish it was in another way. I guess when it was rains it pours. But really we're doing O.K. The kids all slept very well last night including this mom. The kiddo's are happy and getting along this morning. We're doing better than I thought we would be yesterday. Hopefully everyone's good mood will keep through the long weekend.