And the strep exits the stage!

Cara is back to normal! After a trip to the emergency room over concern for swelling above her eye and lethargy, Cara made a rebound and returned to her normal, destructive self. From the ER visit, we learned that Cara is allergic to the antibiotic that her doctor prescribed in good faith in an attempt to prevent Cara's body from building an immunity against the frequently prescribed Amoxicillin. Once we ruled out any neurological problems causing the swelling, it became apparent that we were dealing with a nasty allergic reaction. Once Cara was switched back to good old Amox and given some antihistamine, she was herself again within 36 hours, no sign of the strep throat! It was hard to remember that she had been a lifeless little girl for almost a week. She was up playing, eating & drinking in no time. Yay, major potential crisis averted!

Go away strep, you are not welcome here!

Poor Cara is sick once again. The kiddo seems to get hit with something about every couple of months. This time, it's our good buddy, strep throat, once again. This time, it seems to have reared it's nasty, ugly head and knocked Cara out cold. She's been down & out for about 5 days now with no sign of improvement.

We ended up in the ER yesterday afternoon because Cara woke up with a large amount of swelling over her right eye (her shunt side) and she was pointing to her head along with lots of whining. Not wanting to blow this off, we packed up and headed to Children's Hospital. We were quickly assigned a room and had a neurosurgery resident in to examine Cara and talk with us. The concern, initially, was for inter cranial pressure due to Cara's low heart rate and high blood pressure in triage. The doctor ordered a rapid MRI (only takes 3 minutes to complete) to check on her ventricles which would insure that he shunt was working properly. Cara did really well with the MRI and we were soon back in our room awaiting the results. Her ER doctor come back after about 30 minutes of waiting for the MRI results to tell us that everything appeared to be fine and that, most likely, Cara is suffering from an allergic reaction to the antibiotics that were prescribed to her the previous day by our family practitioner.

She prescribed something called Cefdinir which was new to us since, in the past, Cara has always had Amoxicillin, which quickly did it's job and made her better. Her doctor's reasoning for trying the new drug as a good one, she didn't want Cara to build up an immunity to the Amoxicillin since she's had so many doses in the past 12 months (strep, ear infection, etc). However, it appears that the new drug didn't agree with Cara, thus causing the swelling and other symptoms.

The ER equipped us with an prescription for Amoxicillin (better to stick with what you know works and deal with the consequences later than switch to something that doesn't) which we quickly filled at the in-house Walgreen's and sent us home to be seen by the neurosurgery clinic next week. We are to watch for any signs that she is worsening or not getting any better despite the medication switch. A big thing that we are watching for is swelling along her shunt tract which runs from the top of her head, behind her ear and into her stomach. The doctor did say that it could take 72 hours for the Cefdinir to get out of her system, so we may have a long wait to see any improvement.

That said, it is so hard to sit here and watch Cara sleep and be so lifeless. She hasn't had any solid food since Monday evening and only drinks about 24oz of milk a day. She sleeps probably 20 out of 24 hours and if she is awake, she is tossing and turning, whining and just looking so uncomfortable. It just breaks my heart. I want nothing more than to have our usual Cara back. Even if that means the little terror who whips through our house like a tornado, leaving toy piles and other destruction in her wake. Right now, that would be a welcomed sight! Hopefully, by Monday, she will be back to her old self and all of this will just be a memory.

So, can I ask for positive thoughts, crossed fingers and prayers for Cara's speedy recovery? Goodness knows this little girl has been through enough! I really don't want the ER ward to become our second home, nor the pharmacy.

On a side note, we are going to look into a sulfur allergy for Cara. It seems that the Cefdinir has sulfur in it while Amoxicillin does not. Sulfur (sulfa, sulfate) is in so many things and would explain a prevalent skin "rash" that Cara seems to have. I have read that this is a very common allergy and some family members are even allergic so, who knows...maybe we solved the mystery of the eye swelling as well as the rash. I plan to bring this up to her neurosurgeon as well as our family practitioner.

Hodge Podge

My profound apologies for slacking in the blogging department as of late. Time just flies by when you're busy & having fun! Here's what we've been up to.

Halloween 2009--
As usual the weeks & days leading up to Halloween were full of fun activities for our family. We received an invitation from some dear friends in Boulder to come to their church's Halloween celebration. The girls had fun painting little pumpkins, decorating cookies, getting their faces painted, making treat bags and playing with festive orange Play Doh. Caitlin, Ben & I went to the "kid-friendly" haunted forest but Cara wanted nothing to do with it and promptly started crying and wanting to exit the forest. We ended the night by listening to Halloween stories followed by the long drive home.





We also received an invitation to a Pumpkin Party hosted by Caitlin's Daisy Scout leader. We enjoyed hot apple cider, yummy cookies and a fantastic pumpkin cake, that looked like a real pumpkin. The girls & I carved our pumpkins too, even Cara got in on the scooping out of the pumpkin innards.





Finally, we wrapped up Halloween by going trick-or-treating not once, but twice. Both girls love the idea of getting candy for free, just by asking politely. During the day, we went to a local pedestrian mall where the girls trick-or-treated at various stores along the mall and also got to participate in a few Halloween activities and see some very creatively carved pumpkins. This was the perfect location and time for Cara since it wasn't scary or dark.
After this, we went to my brother's house west of Denver and trick-or-treated in his neighborhood. Cara lasted for about 10 houses, even though she was scared at time and wanted both mommy & daddy to go with her, before she wanted to find her big sister, who had gone ahead with her aunt & uncle, and go home. Caitlin was satisfied with doing about 3 streets. She was very pleased with her bag full of loot (which was carefully rationed by her loving parents...why didn't some one tell me that dentists were buying candy?).







All in all, the girls had a wonderful Halloween and this was the first year that Cara really understood what it was all about.

Birthday parties--
Caitlin has been invited to two birthday parties so far this year, both for classmates. The first was a party held at Monkey Bizness, an indoor inflatable play area. Caitlin and her classmates had a lot of fun bouncing and climbing around. She even talked me into climbing up and going down the big slide. I have to say, it was blast!





The second birthday party is this weekend and will be Caitlin's first sleepover party! She's so beyond excited to see her friends and stay up telling stories (I'm guessing that they will all crash hard at some point). All that I have to say is that the birthday girl's mother is one brave soul to have a house full of sugar-high 1st grade girls! I can't wait to hear Caitlin's recount of the night.

School projects--
We have been really busy with all things school related in our house too. Having two kids in school means double the projects and fundraisers. We've had a Daisy Scouts candy & nut sale, school picture days, a Hawaii poster project, an "I am Thankful for" bag and much more in addition to the regular load of homework and nightly reading. Caitlin's school is participating in the Book-It program with Pizza Hut and Caitlin is eagerly awaiting her first coupon for a free pan pizza! Cara & I do daily enrichment activities in a variety of areas, which keeps my creative gears turning as I search for fun and engaging things for us to try.

Sickness--
Right after Halloween, everyone in the family, except for me, came down with Strep throat. After several nurse visits and prescriptions for Amoxicillin, Ben & the girls recovered and were back to their normal selves. I thought it was so comical that Caitlin loved the taste of the medicine so much that she reminded me when it was time for a dose and wanted more after we'd finished the prescribed amount. Thankfully, minus the bout of pretty minor strep throat, everyone's been healthy so far this winter. We are thanking our lucky stars, for sure. As long as I cover every inch of our house with Lysol, I'm sure the germs will stay at bay, right?

After this very lengthy post, I can honestly say that I've caught you all up on happenings in our house. We are now gearing up for Thanksgiving, which we plan to spend with my parents at their home. Being around family is what the holidays are all about.

I hope that you & yours are happy, healthy, warm & safe!

Whoop! Whoop!

I forgot to mention that due to some crazy mixed blessing, Ben was able to be home with us for a very long, luxurious extended weekend. (Which, due to the blizzard, was another blessing in and of itself. I'm glad that I didn't have to worry about him commuting home from work in near white-out conditions, going at a snail's pace and arriving home 5 hours after leaving the office.) On the afternoon of March 25th, Ben got a lovely email from the higher-ups at his job downtown that a co-worker had tested positive for whooping cough. When I first heard, I wasn't all that alarmed since it's a big bank, lots of floors, lots of people. But when Ben came home and told me that he had worked on this lady's computer and noticed that she was "hacking up a storm" and that he suggested that she go home, I knew we were in for some potential trouble. Not to mention that Ben wasn't feeling all that well and was starting to cough--not good signs. He immediately called our D.O. and got an appointment for the following afternoon. Our faithful doctor noticed that Ben was presenting classic whooping cough symptoms and decided to be proactive, not waiting for the test results--which can take up to a week--and started Ben on a antibiotic regime as well as giving him the Dtap vaccine. Of course, being that he was probably contagious, Ben was told not to report to work until Monday. Thankfully, other than a few bouts of coughing and a low-grade fever, Ben has been his normal self and has been able to enjoy having this lazy weekend with the family. It's been a long time since we've had him home for this long of a stretch and it's been really nice. I'm sure that he has appreciated the 8 hours of sleep a night too, a drastic improvement from the *maybe* 3 1/2 hours that he tries to survive on (Did I mention that my husband is my hero?). We spent lots of quality time together, doing nothing specific, just enjoying each other. I can't put it into words, how nice it was. We felt like a normal family for a few, rare & VERY special days.
That all ends tonight as Ben prepares to start his work-week again and we return to the normal routine around here albeit no school for Caitlin due to Spring Break. I am always bittersweet come Sunday nights, but today, I am even more so. I'm going to really miss my husband. Okay, I think I'd better go grab some tissues and cop a hug from the big guy.

**Edited to add: The girls & I are symptom free so far. I'm praying that we're good to go!**

Spring Fever

Unfortunately, I'm not talking about budding trees, baseball season or warmer days, I am talking about an actual fever, as in not feeling well. The stuffy nose, sore throat variety seems to have decided to make a stop on it's trail of misery. Caitlin has been hit the hardest so far, with a bad sore throat complete with swollen tonsils and lymph nodes and a nose that runs like a faucet. We almost make an ER run last night when her fever spiked to 102. Thankfully, she seems to be better today, slowly on the mend. I seem to have picked up with she has too, though a more mild version. I've been blessed with a stuffy nose and a very mild throat irritation. Cara seems to be unscathed for the time being and we are keeping our fingers crossed. Nothing is worse than a sick baby who cannot tell you, in words, what hurts.

But, yes, though, Spring is in the air around here. I looked out our bedroom window this morning and saw little green buds on the trees. The grass is also starting to green up and, it's supposed to be 70 degrees here today. Hopefully, we'll all be back to our old selves soon and able to enjoy this beautiful weather!

No sick days

*scratch, scratch, cough, cough* That is me. It seems that I have come down with a little cold/ear ache of some sort. It started yesterday with a slight irritation in my throat and now, it REALLY hurts to swallow, drink, etc. I'm also really hot and dizzy. As much as I'd love to sleep all day and wallow in self-pity...moms don't get sick days. So, I must plow on. I have Weight Watchers tonight though I'm not sure if I will gather up enough energy for the 30 minute drive to the meeting site. I'm sincerely hoping that both girls will be good to me today so that I can take it easy. I will, however, have to make a trek to the market to get some cough drops or something. *sighs* I hate being sick. I'm just praying that neither of the girls gets what I have. Nothing more pitiful than sick kids.