The virus from HELL

My poor sweet baby girl has been so sick since Friday with the virus from HELL.  I am telling you I have never seen anything affect her like this before.  She woke up on Friday morning with a stuffy nose and a slight fever.  As the day went on she got worse and worse -her fever went higher and higher.  We were giving her Children's Advil every 6 hours but by the 5 hour mark she was on the steady rise again.  So this went on until Sunday night when her temp spiked to 105.7.  We called the on call Pedi for the second time.  They told us to put her in a warm tub (water doesn't have to be cool since you basically just want to have the water evaporate off the skin and that itself will cool the body temp) & give her Advil again.  So this is what we did and her temp went down 3 degrees in 20 minutes (if this didn't happen we were going to be off to the ER).  We were back in business of being able to control her fever.

We were given a appointment with her PCP at 10am on Monday morning.  She wasn't really eating or drinking much but on assessment she looked fairly well.  She was weighted at the appointment and is 36.6 pounds.  Her throat looked red so they did a throat culture.  The culture came back negative so I assume she was red due to breathing through her mouth because her sinuses were blocked.  They did a finger stick (fun time) to check her CBC which was slightly elevated but on track for a viral infection.  They wanted a urine sample but she had not peed since 7am that morning.  So they sent us on our way saying she was alright but to keep pushing fluids.

By Monday night at 8pm she STILL had not peed and really wasn't eating or drinking anything.  I was offering her everything under the sun and she wouldn't take anything.  I called the ON CALL again and we were sent to the ER.  I guess they don't want to see kids go more than 4-6 hours without peeing.  So we check in at the ER at 9:30pm and sat in the waiting area until 11pm.  The waiting area was a post all in itself.  OMG people are weird!!!  So we go into our room in the PEDI ER and sit for another half hour before the doctor comes in.  Savannah and I were in the bathroom when the doc came in.  By the grace of GOD she peed!  I was so happy!  The doc (who was older than a dinosaur) examined her and said she wasn't dehydrated, keep pushing fluids and call her PCP in the AM.

We got home from the hospital at 1:30am and were all in bed by 2am.  At 2:30am Savannah woke up with a fever of 103.5 (are you f'ing kidding me!!!)  We gave her more Advil, put her on the toilet and she peed again!  YAY!!!

We put her back to bed at 3am but of course I couldn't sleep because I had to keep checking on her every half hour.  I am a "what if" person very bad.  Like VERY BAD.
-What if she stops breathing in her sleep (even though her lungs were clear)
-What if the Advil didn't bring down her fever this time and she had a seizure
So another night goes by with me getting about 2 hours sleep.

Savannah slept from 3am until 9am.  I called her PEDI and spoke with one of the nurses Tuesday morning to follow up from our ER visit.  Let me just remind you that I am 37 weeks pregnant, hormonal, I haven't slept more than 15 hours total in the past 4 nights & I have been taking care of my VERY sick child for the past 4 days.  The nurse kept telling me that if she didn't pee again soon we would have to bring her BACK to the ER again!  The nurse kept telling me "you need to get her to drink".  I freaking know I NEED to get her to drink but I offered her a hundred different drinks and she refused.  I have tried straws, syringes, little cups.  She refuses EVERYTHING.  I lost it with her at this point because I was getting her to eat apple sauce & watermelon but the nurse didn't seem to be impressed.  I figured that was better than nothing (which it was-she was just kinda a B****).  I stared crying on the phone telling her we were not going back to the ER because they were not going to do anything for her.  They didn't want to give her IV fluids or a cath since she did pee.  They checked her skin, in her mouth & said her teary eyes were all signs that she wasn't dehydrated.  At this time I insisted that the nurse have Savannah's PCP call me because I didn't need her telling me I "needed to get her to take fluids".  How do I force a 3 year old to drink??

In the mean time Jay's grandparents went to the store for me and got blueberries & strawberries.  I made myself a bowl of corn & rice chex cereal to eat while I was trying to force watermelon down Savannah's throat.  Sav takes one look at my bowl and says she wants it.  So I end up getting her to eat most of it (it also had milk).  I was so sooooooo exicted you have no idea!!!  An hour or so later I had her sit on the toilet and she peed!!!  I was beyond thrilled!!!  As the afternoon went on she ended up eating 4 100% juice Popsicles.  She then peed again a few hours later.  It was like a Christmas miracle!  She took a 2 hour nap this afternoon and ate another bowl of cereal with berries & 3oz of milk at dinner.  After dinner she peed again so I collected this urine and brought it to the doctor this morning.  They tested it and said she wasn't dehydrated and was clear for a UTI. 

So far today (it's 12:45pm) she has peed twice since sh woke up at 9am.  Other than a VERY sore and cracked nose she is doing very well.  Her appetite is slowly returning so we are letting her eat anything she wants.  She will go to nap at 2pm and hopefully peed before bed.  I called her out of school for tomorrow so she can rest up and she has school vacation next week.

I pray to God that Jay and I don't get this sickness.  It has just been awful!  Hopefully the rest of our winter will be healthier but I am sure Sav will bring something else home from school before the Spring.  Ahhhhhh the joy's of school!