The last 2 1/2 weeks have been hell on earth a little hard. My kids have been sick before. But they have NEVER been this sick and for this long.
The night I came back (Saturday) from being out of town for my mom's birthday (see previous post), I got a text from Nick that Tommy had thrown up, but was acting okay. When I got home that night, I gave him lots of cuddles, but he seemed fine. We tucked him into bed and no sooner than I laid down my head....I heard the vomit. Yuck.
I hate vomit. Like, I smell it and gag. I see it and gag. I hear it.....I gag. I ran into his room praying to God that it wouldn't be the chunky, gross, smelly kind of vomit and I lucked out. We got him all cleaned up and got the sheets changed and went back to bed. An hour later....he got sick again. Put that on repeat for the next several hours.
I felt SO bad for the little guy. He was miserable and by the end of the night was just dry heaving. For a four year old that doesn't understand what the heck his body is doing, it was traumatic. But with the rising of the sun, that seemed to be the end of his illness. Sunday passed without incident.
I held my breath, just KNOWING Tessa was going to get it soon. Tuesday night, we laid down in bed. Not 10 minutes later I heard throwing up and thought, "Oh great, here she goes." But I went in their bedroom and Tommy had gotten sick again. What the what?!? Not fair for him to be going through a SECOND round of it! We got everything cleaned up and put extra sheets and towels all over his bed. We went back to bed again and twenty minutes after closing our eyes, our door slammed open and Tommy screamed, "Mommy! Tessa is pukin' alllllll over!"
Awesome.
The problem with Tessa getting sick is she doesn't realize what's happening and just lays there while she gets sick. I was SO afraid she was going to choke. I slept on their floor that night and held her head while she got sick every hour for the next several hours. I called in to work the next day (Wednesday). Both of the kids rested and seemed to be feeling better. Tessa didn't get sick for most of the afternoon, so I thought we were in the clear.
But alas, we were not. They took turns getting sick Wednesday night. I called in AGAIN (on Thursday). At this point, they were both having other tummy issues (I won't go into detail). They spent most of the day either in the restroom or in bed. When my kids are laying still, I KNOW how horrible they feel. It was sad, but we got in lots of snuggles and I got in lots of housework while they were napping!
They both slept all of Thursday night without incident and woke up feeling okay Friday morning. However, I had a text on my phone when I woke up from my husband saying that he was downstairs and had been up all night getting sick. And he stayed sick alllllllllll weekend. I felt so bad for him. My family was going down one by one!
He felt well enough to go to work Monday for a few hours, but had to come home mid-morning. Around noon, I got a text from my sister that Tommy felt warm and asking if she should give him ibuprofen.
My stomach sank and I knew we were in for more illness. I picked them up from Brooke's and he was still hot after having ibuprofen. He ran a fever all night and all day Tuesday. I had to stay home from work AGAIN on Tuesday. His fever stayed under control if we alternated tylenol and ibuprofen, but as soon as it started wearing off, he would be burning hot again. He had a fever and horrible cough all week, so we scheduled an appt for Friday morning.
And I'm SO glad we did. He has pneumonia.
No good.
They prescribed an antibiotic and within 2 doses, I could tell he was feeling SO much better. But Tessa started going down hill. Because, of COURSE! She got a fever and sounded junky and was coughing non-stop. I called our doctor's office on Monday to see if they could just call something out since Tommy was diagnosed with pneumonia and we could tell Tessa was heading that direction quickly. But they never called me back. Not even to say that we needed to be seen before prescribing anything.
That was the push we needed to find a new doctor. I've been on the fence about switching because I like our doctor for the most part and I love his staff. They're friendly and competent and usually pretty quick about returning our calls. However, our doctor is just SO hesitant and stingy on handing out meds.
And don't get me wrong. I don't WANT my kids on antibiotics all the time and I don't need something to give them just because they blink funny. But they both have asthma and Nick and I feel like their illness has to be worst case scenario and we have to go to their office a minimum of two or three times before he'll prescribe anything. And even then, he's hesitant to prescribe it. And the illnesses he thinks could be viral but FINALLY prescribes an antibiotic for ALWAYS clear up after a few days on an antibiotic. It just gets really frustrating and time consuming and I hate seeing our kids be sick for weeks at a time before anything will be done.
So we decided to see a new doctor on Tuesday. We knew we wanted to go to somebody in Andover and there's like a total of 4 clinics in Andover. We'd already tried two and have ruled out one from the start, so we went with the one that was left. And I am SO glad we did. His name is Jason Hampl and he seemed so great! Of course, I know everyone puts their best foot forward when being introduced for the first time, but he listened to all of our concerns about our previous doctor. He assured us that he doesn't like to overly medicate, but is usually quicker to prescribe something for kids with asthma because their illness seems to escalate quickly and last forever (which is SO true). His office was clean and new and modern and the staff was great with Tessa. AND they have a killer train table in the kids area of the waiting room that Tommy will love ;) Bonus!
They took an x-ray of Tessa and said she doesn't have pneumonia, but did have bronchitis. He prescribed her an antibiotic and a steroid and after just two doses, we've seen improvement.
I'm really hoping this is the end our illness roller coaster. Praise God, I've managed to be the only one in the house that didn't come down with something. Which is good, because then there would have been nobody left to take care of everybody else! Praying that we keep being happy with our new doctor and that my kids are soon-to-be illness free!
The night I came back (Saturday) from being out of town for my mom's birthday (see previous post), I got a text from Nick that Tommy had thrown up, but was acting okay. When I got home that night, I gave him lots of cuddles, but he seemed fine. We tucked him into bed and no sooner than I laid down my head....I heard the vomit. Yuck.
I hate vomit. Like, I smell it and gag. I see it and gag. I hear it.....I gag. I ran into his room praying to God that it wouldn't be the chunky, gross, smelly kind of vomit and I lucked out. We got him all cleaned up and got the sheets changed and went back to bed. An hour later....he got sick again. Put that on repeat for the next several hours.
I felt SO bad for the little guy. He was miserable and by the end of the night was just dry heaving. For a four year old that doesn't understand what the heck his body is doing, it was traumatic. But with the rising of the sun, that seemed to be the end of his illness. Sunday passed without incident.
I held my breath, just KNOWING Tessa was going to get it soon. Tuesday night, we laid down in bed. Not 10 minutes later I heard throwing up and thought, "Oh great, here she goes." But I went in their bedroom and Tommy had gotten sick again. What the what?!? Not fair for him to be going through a SECOND round of it! We got everything cleaned up and put extra sheets and towels all over his bed. We went back to bed again and twenty minutes after closing our eyes, our door slammed open and Tommy screamed, "Mommy! Tessa is pukin' alllllll over!"
Awesome.
The problem with Tessa getting sick is she doesn't realize what's happening and just lays there while she gets sick. I was SO afraid she was going to choke. I slept on their floor that night and held her head while she got sick every hour for the next several hours. I called in to work the next day (Wednesday). Both of the kids rested and seemed to be feeling better. Tessa didn't get sick for most of the afternoon, so I thought we were in the clear.
But alas, we were not. They took turns getting sick Wednesday night. I called in AGAIN (on Thursday). At this point, they were both having other tummy issues (I won't go into detail). They spent most of the day either in the restroom or in bed. When my kids are laying still, I KNOW how horrible they feel. It was sad, but we got in lots of snuggles and I got in lots of housework while they were napping!
They both slept all of Thursday night without incident and woke up feeling okay Friday morning. However, I had a text on my phone when I woke up from my husband saying that he was downstairs and had been up all night getting sick. And he stayed sick alllllllllll weekend. I felt so bad for him. My family was going down one by one!
He felt well enough to go to work Monday for a few hours, but had to come home mid-morning. Around noon, I got a text from my sister that Tommy felt warm and asking if she should give him ibuprofen.
My stomach sank and I knew we were in for more illness. I picked them up from Brooke's and he was still hot after having ibuprofen. He ran a fever all night and all day Tuesday. I had to stay home from work AGAIN on Tuesday. His fever stayed under control if we alternated tylenol and ibuprofen, but as soon as it started wearing off, he would be burning hot again. He had a fever and horrible cough all week, so we scheduled an appt for Friday morning.
And I'm SO glad we did. He has pneumonia.
No good.
They prescribed an antibiotic and within 2 doses, I could tell he was feeling SO much better. But Tessa started going down hill. Because, of COURSE! She got a fever and sounded junky and was coughing non-stop. I called our doctor's office on Monday to see if they could just call something out since Tommy was diagnosed with pneumonia and we could tell Tessa was heading that direction quickly. But they never called me back. Not even to say that we needed to be seen before prescribing anything.
That was the push we needed to find a new doctor. I've been on the fence about switching because I like our doctor for the most part and I love his staff. They're friendly and competent and usually pretty quick about returning our calls. However, our doctor is just SO hesitant and stingy on handing out meds.
And don't get me wrong. I don't WANT my kids on antibiotics all the time and I don't need something to give them just because they blink funny. But they both have asthma and Nick and I feel like their illness has to be worst case scenario and we have to go to their office a minimum of two or three times before he'll prescribe anything. And even then, he's hesitant to prescribe it. And the illnesses he thinks could be viral but FINALLY prescribes an antibiotic for ALWAYS clear up after a few days on an antibiotic. It just gets really frustrating and time consuming and I hate seeing our kids be sick for weeks at a time before anything will be done.
So we decided to see a new doctor on Tuesday. We knew we wanted to go to somebody in Andover and there's like a total of 4 clinics in Andover. We'd already tried two and have ruled out one from the start, so we went with the one that was left. And I am SO glad we did. His name is Jason Hampl and he seemed so great! Of course, I know everyone puts their best foot forward when being introduced for the first time, but he listened to all of our concerns about our previous doctor. He assured us that he doesn't like to overly medicate, but is usually quicker to prescribe something for kids with asthma because their illness seems to escalate quickly and last forever (which is SO true). His office was clean and new and modern and the staff was great with Tessa. AND they have a killer train table in the kids area of the waiting room that Tommy will love ;) Bonus!
They took an x-ray of Tessa and said she doesn't have pneumonia, but did have bronchitis. He prescribed her an antibiotic and a steroid and after just two doses, we've seen improvement.
I'm really hoping this is the end our illness roller coaster. Praise God, I've managed to be the only one in the house that didn't come down with something. Which is good, because then there would have been nobody left to take care of everybody else! Praying that we keep being happy with our new doctor and that my kids are soon-to-be illness free!
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