{"id":668,"date":"2009-07-15T19:19:00","date_gmt":"2009-07-15T23:19:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.michellebeachy.com\/blog\/wednesday-july-15-2009\/"},"modified":"2009-07-15T19:19:00","modified_gmt":"2009-07-15T23:19:00","slug":"wednesday-july-15-2009","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.michellebeachy.com\/blog\/wednesday-july-15-2009\/","title":{"rendered":"Wednesday July 15, 2009"},"content":{"rendered":"

It feels like a long time since I’ve written anything of substance. And why I am blogging now when my brain is shutting down is more than I can tell. Except that writing has always been an amazing outlet for me. Getting things out of my brain seems to help me regain perspective. And since I told David my blood pressure feels like it might be around 230 over 176, writing might be a good idea.
\"Liam<\/a>
These days feel like deja vu. Days of screaming baby, remembering when the last does of advil and tylenol were administered, night wakings, hours and hours and hours rocking and walking and singing and hushing and walking again. Snot wiping, temperature checking, diarrhea explosions and worrying. Always worrying. <\/p>\n

I get scared whenever someone with a virus is in the same building as Liam. Last weekend was a family reunion (make that the weekend before actually) and Liam started with a low grade fever and cough Monday night before we started home. He had “a cold” the next few days and then just as I thought he was getting better, his temperature spiked to 103 and stayed. By Saturday night I was alternating motrin and tylenol on top of each other and Monday night I took him to see the on call pediatrician. By the time Liam was four hours into his motrin dose, his temp would head right back up to to 103 and above. I’d give him Tylenol but he would continue to grow increasingly miserable. The hour after his motrin kicked in was always his best hour. And, of course, that was the hour the doctor saw him. After a few negative leads he took a peek in his ear. An ear infection. In his words: “This is not just an ear infection. This is pus everywhere, ear drum bulging ear infection.” And so we got azithromycin since Liam is allergic to penicillens. And then he dared to say, “I’m surprised he doesn’t have more pain.”
\"July<\/a>
Really. Doctors should never make statements like that to moms who have taken care of insanely fussy babies all weekend. Home we went only to endure another scary night. When Liam woke up the next time I held him close to me and felt the heat of his body burn through both our clothes. He cried and then stopped. And then his entire body started jerking. Just little, rhythmic jerks. I was so afraid. I held him and watched his eyes. Listened to his tachypneic breathing and scream whispered to David Lee that something is very wrong. When nothing worse happened and he stopped, I relaxed a little. He didn’t seem post-ictal but I have no idea what seizures in babies look like. The next morning it happened again. <\/p>\n

I was so hoping the antibiotics were doing double time and thought the day would go at least somewhat better. Instead, he got much worse. From 10:00 on he screamed. Little breaks here and there but mostly screaming. And writhing. After an hour and a half I simply could not take it any longer. I called in to talk to the nurse and she called back to say they would call in a prescription for antipyrine drops. By then Liam had finally drifted off. He woke up screaming forty minutes later and cried almost the entire way to the drug store. If you think you are a strong person, I dare you to listen to a baby scream for hours on end. Honestly, I have never had a baby with colic but I have seen fussy. Fussy and screaming are very different. <\/p>\n

The pharmacist said to warm the drops and he should get instant relief. I warmed them, tested the temperature and inserted. He arched his back and screamed even louder. After thirty minutes (how long is instant?) I called the pediatrician again. I don’t even want to know what they relayed in the office (the mom is crying and the baby is screaming in the background, I think it’s pretty bad ???) but they said to bring him in. And downtown we went again. Mercifully he fell asleep on the way in. And even better I got to see his regular doctor. He listened to the whole sobby story and said the tremors were probably febrile tremors. “Some kids get them just before a seizure.” And then he checked ears and said the bad one looked better but, oh, the other one is infected now too. <\/p>\n

And now it’s today. The fever is gone and Liam is playing alone some. Still not eating much. Still not drinking enough to wet many diapers. Definitely still not sleeping. But just as definitely not screaming as much.
\"July<\/a>
The diarrhea is much worse thanks to the antibiotics. But what I do not like is the nagging fear in the pit of my stomach that something bigger is going on that we’re missing. What is making him pick up everything for miles around and then get much sicker with it than anyone else? And food intolerances? That’s a story for another day. I just wish he could feel well.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It feels like a long time since I’ve written anything of substance. And why I am blogging now when my brain is shutting down is more than I can tell.… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-668","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p39ynQ-aM","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.michellebeachy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/668","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.michellebeachy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.michellebeachy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.michellebeachy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.michellebeachy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=668"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.michellebeachy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/668\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.michellebeachy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=668"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.michellebeachy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=668"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.michellebeachy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=668"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}