There will be TMI in this post. You've been warned.
At some point between Monday morning when we saw Dr. H and today when we saw Dr. ENT, Claire's ears magically healed.
I'm really relieved that I didn't go with Dr. H's first answer, when she saw fluid on Claire's ears, which was to do a third course of antibiotics. "I don't love that idea," I said. "She was throwing up all day Sunday, and she has horrible diaper rash and diarrhea. I think her little body has had enough antibiotics, what else can we do?" That's when she wrote the referral to the ENT.
36 hours passed, and the ENT looked at her ears and stuck some thing in them to test the movement of her eardrums, and pronounced her ears "perfect." Hooray for avoiding unnecessary antibiotics! Boo for paying $50 to be told that everything's fine.
She's no longer throwing up, thank goodness, but she has a horrible case of the runs, and the worst diaper rash I think I've ever seen. This is a cruel combination, because she's having tons of dirty diapers, and yet it hurts her terribly to be cleaned. We gave her a bath in the oatmeal bath I make (1/3 oatmeal, ground to dust in the blender, 1/3 powdered milk, 1/3 baking soda, add 1/4 - 1/3 cup to running bath water), then dried her bottom carefully and put a thick coating of Vaseline on it for the night. I'm hoping to see improvement by morning.
Shannyn (who is the crunchiest granola mom I know) suggested feeding her lots of garlic and lots of acidophillus powder, as well as applying the acidophillus topically, and cutting out sugar, fruit, and juice completely. I've been rinsing out the baby wipes so they don't sting. Any other suggestions welcome. We've tried Balmex, clortrimazole, yogurt, using washcloths instead of wipes (yuck), etc. I don't want to let her go around without a diaper because 1) it's not warm enough here for her to do that outside yet, and 2) I don't want diarrhea all over my house.
Claire was SUCH a big girl at the doctor. She climbed right up in the chair and let him look in her ears without protest. She let the assistant do the eardrum test thing, and didn't move a muscle. She was a complete doll the entire time. I was so proud of her.
It is so hard when you can't make them better, isn't it? It's the most helpless, terrible feeling. I would give anything to take the hurt away. But I do have perspective - look to the right for the picture of little Stellan. Click the picture to be taken to his mommy's blog, to read his story. He's struggling terribly right now, and our problems feel very small. I know there are children all over the world who are ill or in pain, and who would gratefully trade places with Claire and her crummy tummy and her diaper rash. I know. But knowing this doesn't change the fact that she's my baby, and my job is to make her better, and to hurt when she hurts.
Oh, it's late. And I have to pick Mimi and Trey up at the airport in the morning (although not half as early as I had to drop them off!) so I'd better go to bed. I hope your bottoms are healthy and your tummies are not crummy.
5 comments:
Hey! Weleda products are pure magic. They are a German company and they are all about squashing up flowers and only flowers in their products (not really, but you get my drift). They're like the leader/oldest/best known in extremely natural yet extremely effective skin care. I have used their calendula creams & oils exclusively on Esther's eczema and it has pretty much cleared up except for outbreaks here and there, which it also takes care of within 24 hours. Their Calendula Diaper Care is exactly what you/ Claire need, comforting and healing at the same time. Then, also, they have stuff without the zinc oxide called Calendula Baby Cream for maintenance. I think drugstore.com has started carrying their stuff, but I know Saffron Rouge.com also has their products and are helpful and fast.
We use cloth wipes, it's not actually all that bad. Abby seems to prefer those to paper ones since we keep them in a wipe warmer.
Hope she gets to feeling better soon.
You could try lactobacillus pills - they're incredibly tiny, so it would be easy for her to take (and beats trying to get her to eat a gallon of yogurt.) I'm not sure the dosage for a child, so ask the pharmacist. They're in the supplement/vitamin aisle. The next time this happens in our house I'm going to try Cate's suggestion about the Weleda products (there available at a local German deli - go figure.) Good luck to you!
When my daughter had a really bad diaper rash I used corn starch. It cleared it up by the next morning. Give it a try. :)
have you tried Floristore Kids? It's pricey (!!) but it works pretty well. it's a little packet of powder that you can mix into food or disolve into bottles. It helped when Marcus had a rough "go" of it after amoxicillin a month ago. You can get it at the pharmacy...it's behind the counter...you'll want to call before you go though, they don't always have the "kids" version of the medicine.
good luck! fire diapers are hard on everyone involved!
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