Life with Sicko

Friday, Josh and I stayed home because he had a high fever and, “it hurts to swallow, mom.”

After a little give and take between the Tylenol and fever, I finally packed Josh up and took him in to the doctor. The entire ride there, he was beside himself with worry. “Will they stick that thing in my throat that makes me choke? I don’t want to go to the doctor. They’ll choke me and give me shots.”

*sigh*

We got in there and the doctor looks in his throat, then in his ears. He lifted up his shirt and looked at his tummy and said, “I don’t have to swab. It’s definitely strep and scarlet fever.”

Scarlet fever? WTF? Is this the 1920’s? Wasn’t that all the rage back then? I don’t know. I had no idea what scarlet fever was. Didn’t people die from that? Or go blind? Grow hair on their palms?

“Some seasons, for reasons unaccountable, scarlet fever appears in a malignant
form. Such an epidemic occurred in the winter of 1879 in the little village of
Harrison, Ohio, nearly every case resulting fatally, and this was my first
introduction to scarlet fever. So intense was it, and so fatal in its results,
that I have ever had a dread of this disease, and when scarlet fever appears,
there rises before me a picture of that epidemic of 1879.”

SEE!

The doctor must have read my face, and said, “It’s just a rash that accompanies strep throat sometimes.” *whew*

Later, when I called my mom to fill her in, she wasn’t aware of scarlet fever even still being around, or anything about it.

“How do they treat scarlet fever?” she asked.

“Oh, it’s pretty easy. We just have to watch ‘Gone With the Wind’ over and over until Josh is no longer attracted to Vivien Leigh.”

Seriously though, he gave Josh an Rx for Augmentin.

Ever since, Josh has been off of the hook. Running, talking, not listening, throwing things, breaking toys, defiant – a monster. When you ask him what’s going on, the boy starts to cry. We’re talking real tears, not the big fake crocodile tears that come out of one eye at a time. No, these are a steady stream of genuine confusion.

I called the pharmacy last night, and they said that agitation, hyper motor activity and mood swings can be side effects of Augmentin in children.

I called the doctor this morning and told him to take my kid off of it and call in something else. Back to Omnicef, which we’ve had 85,000 times with each ear infection, so I know he tolerates it well.

I think I may have preferred swine flu.