Are You Ready For This?

Last week, when I posted about Caleb being sick, I had it in my head that that was it and we were on our way to recovery. Boy, was I ever wrong! Here is what has happened in the Castleberry household within the last week.

So, the doctor thought Caleb had strep throat and that was the cause of the sores on his face and hands. After being on an antibiotic for two days and Caleb wasn't yet showing signs of improving, I started to wonder what was going on. We were told by both a doctor and a nurse to give him until Saturday morning to show signs of improving; definitely by Sunday. With that in mind, when Caleb woke up Saturday morning with one of his eyes stuck closed and his rash worse than ever, Chris and I decided that he still needed medical attention. We made an appointment with the urgent care and headed out.

It was there that our world was shaken up a bit. We were told that Caleb had herpes. WHAT?!?! Herpes??? Where in the world could he have gotten that from?! He had Herpes Simplex Virus type 1 (or HSV-type 1). There are 8 versions of herpes out there, so apparently it's not unusual for children to get exposed to it. Caleb had a bad reaction because it infected his eczema. You see, herpes is passed by contact with open sores. So, somehow he came into contact with someone who had it (have no idea who!!) and it got into his eczema. Total bummer. So after the doctor figured out what he had, she informed us that Caleb needed to be hospitalized. Hospitalized?! My baby had to go to the hospital?! I was heartbroken. This poor child didn't need another ailment! He's had nothing but ailments since he's been born!!!! First, his congestion that lasted 2-3 months, then his eczema and allergies, which has been an ongoing battle. Good thing he won't remember this first year. :o(

We checked into the hospital that afternoon. Around 3:30 they took Caleb to try to get an IV in. I left to get Laura Anne an overnight bag, as she was going to stay the night at her friend, Jessie's house. I found out after arriving at the hospital later, that they poked Caleb 5 times and could not find a vein. That meant that he had to receive all his meds orally. One of the medicines was a pain killer that hyped him up! He was so fidgety and squirmy all evening! Then they gave him Benadryl for itchiness which put him to sleep!

Sleeping in that hospital room was lots of fun. Chris and I tried to share the one fold-out bed they had and between that and Caleb waking up every 30 minutes to an hour, I did not sleep. At 3, I told Chris (who had gotten some rest) that I needed him to take over. So I went to bed. Apparently Chris had the magic touch because he rocked Caleb right to sleep and Caleb slept most of the rest of the night.

Sunday morning, we were waiting for a visit from the eye doctor. Because Caleb's rash had gotten on his eyelids, right next to his eyes, they wanted to check his eyes and make sure the infection hadn't reached his eyes. We received good news: no infection in his eyes! That meant that we could go home sometime that day because Caleb could be treated from home!! Yay! By 3, we were checked out and headed home.

On a side note, without going into too many details, I noticed on Sunday morning that it was getting uncomfortable to nurse Caleb. As it turns out, he passed on this delightful disease to me! When I mentioned it to the doctor, he suggested that maybe I put off nursing for a few days. Well, since I've been wanting to wean him anyway, I decided that this would be the start of the weaning process. More on that to come.


Okay, so we're home and Caleb has his (very expensive) medicine. Today (Thursday), he's doing much better and his rash is almost gone. Although he is still contagious and will be until his sores are all gone.

But that's not the end of my story. Monday, Laura Anne started acting weird. She started crying for no obvious reason and when I tried to comfort her I noticed that she had a fever. When we were at Caleb's check-up with the pediatrician that afternoon, he looked at Laura Anne's throat and determined that she had a sore throat. Nothing too serious. It just needed to run it's course. Well, I had a sore throat too and throughout the rest of the day, my health started to go downhill. By that evening, I had chills, body aches and a fever as well.

Tuesday was more of the same. Laura Anne and I spent the whole day laying on the couch feeling pitiful. Laura Anne's temperature got as high as 1o2 degrees. I also learned something about her. She talks in her sleep when she's sick. I'm not sure if it's the medicine or the fever, but it's very interesting.

Wednesday, I started off feeling better. No more aches and chills. But that only lasted long enough for me to put a load of laundry in the washing machine and clean up the dishes. Then all my symptoms rushed back. So for the rest of the day I was either in bed, or on the couch!

But today, I think I'm finally on my way to feeling relatively normal. My throat still hurts, but the fever has not come back. Laura Anne is also feeling pretty good. The good news in all of this is that Caleb is doing an excellent job drinking rice milk from a bottle! His pediatrician told us that he can have that since he won't drink formula. Yesterday, I didn't nurse Caleb all day. So right now, he's still comfort nursing during the night a couple times. When he's all better, we'll be weaning him from that as well, and hopefully he'll start sleeping through the night! Fingers crossed! I can almost smell the cheese pizza!!

Here's a few more pictures from the hospital:

This is his excited face! He was feeling pretty good with the pain medicine! He had the cutest little hospital gown that even had little ties in the back. Adorable!

Caleb is playing kick ball with Daddy and Uncle Jerry:
Peekaboo!

Daddy is trying to get some rest while Laura Anne is watching "Merry Christmas, Charlie Brown!"

There was a big xylophone made out of wood outside the main entrance of the hospital. We tried it out before we left: