Day To Day Life: Thursday & Friday

(I apologize in advance, but this is going to be a looong post!)

When Emma woke up on Thursday (August 2nd) at 8:00, she had some red bumps on her chin, but I didn't really think anything of it.  It looked like her saliva had irritated her chin or something.  We did some playing in her room and then watched a little bit of "Signing Time" before Sesame Street came on at 9:00.

She watched SS and kind of ate some breakfast, but definitely not how she usually eats.  She was also a little whiny, but again I didn't really think much about it.  We were a little worried that maybe she had an ear infection so we were glad that we already had an appointment scheduled at 11:00 to rule that out.

We headed out for her doctor's appointment at 10:45.  We were seeing a different doctor because her regular pedi was out of town for the next 2 weeks.  She was having fun playing in the waiting room, so I really didn't know what to expect, except LOTS of crying.  Since her 9 month appointment she has cried and screamed each time we've gone to the doctor.  Even when they're just checking her breathing, she's freaking out.  This time was no different and as soon as the doctor walked in she started to whine.

We pushed through it and I was relieved to hear that her ears were clear. 

Unfortunately as soon as the doctor looked in her mouth (mind you Emma is screaming her head off) she said "Oh yeah, I think it's strep."

She did the swab test and 10 minutes later we had a confirmed case of strep.  She put in the prescription for amoxicillin and we were out the door.

We got home from the doctor at 12:10 and by 12:15 Emma was in her crib ready for a nap.  She didn't actually fall asleep until 12:35, but at least she wasn't upset.

I ran out to do some last minute shopping for our trip.  We were leaving around 9:30 the next morning, so I still had a ton of stuff to do.

I wasn't home yet when she woke up at 2:40, but Tray said she woke up not happy.  I got home a few minutes later and had her medicine, so she got her first dose right away.

She ate a little lunch and we were done by 4:00.

We had to go drop the dogs off with Tray's parents since we wouldn't be back home until Sunday, so while we got things ready we put on another episode of SS.  We left at 4:30 and Emma was fine on the way there.

We got to Nana and Pops' house about 40 minutes later and Emma had fun playing.  She was looking and feeling the best she had all day and we were hopeful that the medicine was doing it's thing and our girl was on the mend.  She actually took SEVEN steps all by herself while we were there!  She's so close.

We got home at 8:30 that night and right away I gave her a bath and nursed her.  We tried to give her another dose of medicine, but she fought it a little bit.  I found it odd because she usually LOVES taking medicine.  We seriously have never had a problem with her taking anything.  We played with bubbles for a bit before putting her to bed at 9:25. 

At this point I had to finish packing and getting ready for our trip.  We were headed to Wimberley for a surprise weekend getaway for my mom's 60th birthday.  We had this trip planned for about a month, so I was REALLY looking forward to it!

Well.

Some time around 2:30 Emma woke up SCREAMING.  She was uncomfortable and REFUSING her medicine.  I couldn't even get her to take Tylenol.  I tried everything to calm her down, but she would be okay for a little bit and then start crying again.
I had taken her downstairs to try and get her to eat or drink something (thinking her throat hurt from strep and something cool would calm it down).  By the time Tray woke up I was in tears as well.
At this point I noticed that she was getting more spots on her, especially in her diaper area.  When I went to change her she had the most horrible diaper rash and I told Tray something wasn't right.  I sent him to get popsicles and ice cream, but she just refused that as well.
I was starting to fear that it was Hand, Foot and Mouth Disease because some of the kids in playgroup had already had it.
I called the urgent care place to see if 1. they would see a child her age and 2. if they would be able to give her an antibiotic shot since she was refusing the amoxicillin.
She still had a fever so with the antibiotic and Tylenol, we would have to force two medicines down so I was really hoping she could get a shot so we would only have to worry about Tylenol.  The urgent care place said they would see her, but they couldn't promise anything.
We decided to just take her to Texas Children's because we couldn't bare to watch our baby girl crying so uncontrollably.  Before we left we forced some Tylenol in her which only made her choke and gag the worst I'd ever seen.
I felt TERRIBLE.

On the way to the ER she fell asleep and seemed to be doing MUCH better while we were waiting.  We got there at 4:15 and proceeded to wait......and wait.
She ate a ton of ice while we were waiting and overall did really well.
We finally got to see the doctor who proceeded to tell us that yes it looked like Hand, Foot and Mouth Disease, but since she was already diagnosed with strep they were a little skeptical.  Apparently it is very rare to have both at the same time.  They didn't give her a shot and just told us that we would have to get creative with giving her the medicine.
Even though I felt like we went for nothing, Emma had eaten some graham crackers and drank some milk, so I was okay with going back home, thinking she was on the mend.

We got home around 8:30am Friday morning and the uncontrollable crying started again.

I felt so helpless.

I ended up calling the pediatrician's office again because I didn't know what else to do.
 I desperately wanted to make it better.

We made an appointment with yet another pedi for noon.  

This appointment ended up being the most helpful.

The new diagnosis was full blown Hand, Foot and Mouth Disease.  It turns out that the strep test was more than likely a false positive.  The pedi said that if we couldn't get her to take the amoxicillin it was okay and he gave us a new combination of drugs to try to help with HFM.  A dose of ibuprofen mixed with equal parts Maalox and Benadryl would help the throat and pain.

After a quick trip to Target to get new medicine, Emma had passed out in the truck.  Sleep wasn't coming easily at home, so we decided to let her sleep in the truck so we didn't have to wake her up.  None of us had gotten good sleep, so what did we do?  We proceeded to fall asleep as well.  We took a family nap in the truck, in our driveway, for a solid 30 minutes.  Not the safest thing, but it was necessary.

The rest of the day is a little blurry and I'm not sure what we did, except try to keep our sweet girl happy.  We were having to force down the medicine combo, but it was helping.  She finally decided to try the popsicles that night and was an instant fan.

Obviously we didn't leave on our trip and we were all bummed.  We had this whole surprise perfectly planned out for my mom and I didn't want to tell her what was happening with Emma because I knew she would want to come over.  Everyone else was continuing on with the surprise.

We actually got some much needed sleep Friday night and Emma only woke up once.  

Despite getting some good sleep, when she woke up Saturday morning the bumps had multiplied and gotten much worse.  She was still fighting the medicine, but at least we were able to give it to her.  It was an odd combination, but something about it worked.  She was starting to eat more too.

We were so happy to see that she was kind of feeling better, even though the bumps were so bad.

Each medicine dose started to get easier to give and we just prepared ourselves to ride out the week-long sickness.

By Monday she was really starting to be herself.  

I, on the other hand, was not.