To pox or not to pox that is the question...

Okay a bit corny but bear with me. Tuesday, my middle one came to me and said the nurse at school put some anti-itch creme on her arm for her bug bites. I asked her to show them to me and they were four big bites that looked like mosquito bites. For her they get big and swollen and they scab over usually at the site of the bite. We didn't think much of it and then the next day she said she had more. She showed me that she was bitten on her belly too. I forgot about it later, the bad mom I am and Thursday she had them on her legs, back, belly, both arms and one on her chin. Well, I woke up with these and thought hmmm....maybe it is in her bed. I stripped her bed down and pulled out all her clothes that were on the floor. I looked under the mattress for signs of bugs or ugh bed bugs... nothing... whew.

That night I tucked her in and looked again and thought maybe they are chicken pox and her body is reacting funny to them and causing them to be bigger than normal. I looked it up on the internet and found that often they look like bug bites and get a little white puss in the middle and then pop and scab over. Sounds a lot like what is going on here. My better half and I talk and decide to look at them in the morning and call the doctor. The next morning they are still there and she has another one too. We call and get an appointment. We send her to school and I go to work and as I am sitting there I start to feel very guilty that we sent her to school contageous with a highly transferable disease. I call the nurse attendant who just happens to be my hubby's aunt and she takes one look at her and tells me to come get her.

On my way to pick her up I call the doctor's office again and ask to get an earlier appointment and tell them that she may have chicken pox. They then tell me not to bring her and to treat her for them at home. I told them I wanted a difinitive diagnosis and I wanted her seen and by the way doesn't the CDC want a diagnosis and a count and aren't they doing a disservice to all the classmates who need to know if a child has been sitting in their class touching their pencils with this disease? The nurse then says to bring her in before they reopen for the afternoon appointments. Basically, please come when there aren't any patients around. They then said to tell the office worker to send you straight back to the examining rooms. Okay.

So we get there and she doesn't have the pox, she has HIVES! The doc asks if there was anything that we changed recently, foods, drinks, soaps, shampoos, detergents..... YES!!! my husband thought it would be okay to buy the generic brand of laundry detergent and I did laundry last weekend. Yes most of her clothes were in the wash and yes they were washed with the generic detergent. The doctor said that it was most likely what was causing the hives and that they have been coming on gradually all week because she has been wearing the clothes freshly washed all week.

Final answer? Benadryl and rewash all the clothes I washed last week, including all towels, bedsheets and anything that she will come into contact with.

Thanks honey for trying to save a penny....

Baby Seals

I asked my sister to help me today to come up with a topic for a blog entry. I said anything and she gave me "baby seals". I said, "okay, baby seals it is."

This subject, I thought would be difficult for me as I don't live near a place where seals inhabit. I did go to San Francisco several years back and went shopping on a dock overlooking the harbor. It was a beautiful, yet windy day. We wore sweaters and were still a bit chilly but I didn't want to wear a jacket for fear of having to carry it around. The shops were nice but I don't remember anything special there, and I didn't buy anything. I do remember walking towards the water and letting the wind hit my face and enjoying the briskness of it. There were seals lounging on the floating docks around this shopping area. They were making these great noises and some of them were wrestling around with each other. It was fun to watch.

I usually don't think about this area much nor really the shopping on the dock, however it all came back to me two years ago when I heard a news story about a woman and her three young children. Apparently the children were missing and later they would be found and she would be arrested for murder. The story was so horrific to me that it brings me to tears just thinking about it.

On chilly, but sunny day this woman and her three babies, the oldest just 6 years old and the youngest just 9 months, were out on a dock similar to the one that I was on shopping. The woman stripped the children down to no clothes and one by one and tossed them in the water. She later states that they wanted to go swimming. She later is found to be mentally ill. Each child, though, stripped down and tossed in the 50 some degree water. There were other people on the dock that day but no one either saw her or for whatever reason stopped her.

I just don't understand how someone could hurt a child. I don't understand how a mother could toss her children in the cold water. I don't understand how no one saw her or stopped her. I read so many news articles of adults harming or killing children and in our times now it seems to be common. Even the TV dramas like ER, Law and Order, CSI, and such almost enjoy making a child injury, murder, abuse, etc, show because they know they will get the ratings as people will watch it. I had to stop watching ER because there were too many children on it. I can't watch Law and Order any more for the same reasons. I truly believe that if we allow our TV networks to air shows like this then we are only making these types of crimes "acceptable" and we are conditioning our children to not find it horrific and shocking when these types of things occur in our society.

It is just sick and sad.

The Fever

My oldest came down with a fever on Wednesday of last week. He continued to have a fever until Sunday morning. Sunday morning my middle one started with a fever. She is still sick today and currently curled up on the couch sleeping. If her's lasts as long as the older one's fever did we should expect her to be out of school through Wednesday.

The last time we all got sick it was the Norovirus. We all caught it and it was one rough weekend with kids throwing up this way and that and the parents running to the bathroom every few minutes. (sorry for the visual) It ran through the whole family.

So far My youngest hasn't shown any fever yet nor have me and my husband. I don't know if that is a good thing or if we are still waiting for our time. Agh. I hate the waiting game.