So when I posted about the flu on Monday, I figured BBZ was basically over his illness. Not so much. Monday night around midnight BBZ woke up and came into our room. I went into his room with him and he was absolutely burning up. I took his temp and it was 104.6! I freaked out. I gave him some Tylenol and waited.
At 12:30am I took his temp again and it was still in the 104s. I called the exchange and spoke to a very kind nurse who said it can sometimes take an hour to bring the temp down. She stayed on the phone with me for about 15 minutes as e waited for the temp to drop. It went down to 103ish and we got off the phone.
He was shaking and shivering and even whining and moaning a little as he tried to sleep. I know he was miserable, poor baby. I stayed in his room with him most of the night, but couldn't sleep. I kept thinking about how I would manage taking him to the hospital in the middle of the night. Would I take LBZ with me? He still wakes to nurse at night and would likely not take a bottle if I wasn't there. Should N take BBZ on his own? Could I handle not being with him at the hospital?
Ugh. Luckily his temp stayed down and we didn't have to go anywhere. N stayed home with him on Tuesday since I had a meeting and took him to the doctor. Diagnosis? Double ear infection. Sound familiar? That's because LBZ had a double ear infection following this 5 days of fever too.
I can't help but feel like the whole world is against my two boys and their 4 little ears. I think I do everything right. I nursed them, which is *supposed* to reduce the instance of ear infections. I feed them lots of fruits and veggies (well I feed myself those thus passing them to LBZ) and avoid the not-so-healthy foods. BBZ had tubes put in when he was 16 months and while they were still in at his 3-year appointment in September, they had fallen into the ear canal at his appointment in February. That means that they were out for less than a month and he already has an infection.
Boo! I'm hoping the the ear infections came because of how bad the flu was and that he isn't on the path to have them non-stop again like he did before the tubes were placed. It just goes to show though that tubes certainly don't fix the problem, they just make it better for a while.
Depending on how LBZ's ears respond to the chiropractor, that might be the path we take with BBZ too. We'll definitely do that before we consider replacing the tubes.
To add to the flu discussion for us, I am now feeling pretty crappy. We went out to dinner on Wednesday night and on our way home I started to feel not so good. I put the boys to bed and started to feel shaky and light-headed. I took my temp and sure enough, I had a fever. I couldn't sleep much Wednesday night, I guess I just tossed and turned because of the fever. I tried taking Tylenol but it didn't help.
Thursday morning I woke up and my fever was 103.4! That's super high for an adult. I couldn't even move to take the boys to school. I did get up to feed LBZ and get the boys ready but didn't get more done than that. I did manage to get to the doctor who basically said that it was a guess whether I had the flu or a sinus infection. I think I have both. I laid around a lot yesterday but still couldn't sleep. I ended up falling asleep on the couch around 6:30 and got up to put BBZ to bed and fell asleep with him. I woke up feeling a lot better this morning but still had a fever.
I definitely believe that it's better for our bodies to keep the fever and fight the virus rather than taking medicine to reduce the fever, but as a mom I have to be able to function. I have to still take the boys to school and feed LBZ and make dinner and be able to function during my day. It's not as simple as just paying in bed and allowing my body to fight the virus. So Motrin has been my friend the last few days and it has been working great.
So I know I am on the mend, but this flu is no joke. And my head feels completely congested from what I am sure is a sinus infection. I took the boys to school this morning and plan to pick LBZ up early for the chiropractor appointment that I rescheduled from yesterday. There is no way I could have taken him anywhere but home yesterday.
These are the times that I miss my family so much. They live so far away and it would have been nice to have help from them during this illness. When the boys are sick we don't have a back-up for daycare. When I am sick I don't have someone to call to come over and help. Luckily N has avoided this virus and is still healthy (fingers crossed). He has been a huge help, but he can't take off work very often and even last Tuesday he had to rearrange lots of things so I could make it to my important meeting.
I'm so happy that today is Friday and we have another 3-day weekend to recuperate and prepare for another week. Have a great weekend, everyone!
