Rough Ride

We had a pretty rough couple of weeks at our house. Bronson caught his second cold and it lingered just a little bit too long. After he had suffered with his runny nose for two weeks, the cough started. I called the pediatrician's office and got him in to see the nurse. She diagnosed him with pneumonia and sent us on our way with a prescription for antibiotics.

B-man HATED the antibiotics. The first night I gave them to him wasn't too bad. He took them and only shuddered a little bit. But the next morning, he cried and gagged and choked and ended up puking them back up along with his entire bottle. Fun. And so it was, twice a day, for the next couple of days.

Over the course of the weekend, he seemed to be getting worse. I tried not to be a paranoid mom, but by Monday morning, his cough was worse and I just knew that things weren't good. So I called and got him right in to see his doctor. Yup. It was worse. Dr Carter did suspect that he had pneumonia, but said that he also had an ear infection. And RSV. So the rest of our afternoon was spent suctioning out his nose, hooking him up to a nebulizer, getting chest x-rays (which confirmed the pneumonia), running to the pharmacy, and waiting for 40 minutes only to be told that, oops, they didn't have what we needed but they would call another pharmacy for me.

For the next few days, I had to plan an extra 30 minutes per dose of antibiotics so that I could slowly give him his 6 ml without him puking. I also had to plan in an extra 15 minutes of nebulizer, 4 times a day. Oh, and did I mention that his antibiotics gave him some awesome poop which caused extra blow outs and major diaper rash. Desatin wasn't working. Someone suggested A&D. That didn't work. So I finally tried Aquaphor. MIRACLE CREAM! (That stuff has not only cleared up his cradles cap, and his eczema, but now his diaper rash!)

But wait. There's more. Yep, just as Bronson was getting over all of his illnesses, we found a food allergy. While up at Jeff's sister's house, B-man was getting pretty fussy, so I saw a basket of bread slices on the counter. You know, the small slices from a loaf of sourdough bread from Costco. I handed him a slice and let him suck and chew on it for the next 20 minutes. As he was chewing, I noticed that he was getting all red and raw around his mouth, but I figured that it was just from the hard crust on the bread.

Long story short, once we got him back home, we noticed that his entire body was covered in hives and a rash. He refused to eat his bottle and then turned and puked ALL down the front of me. And then he did it again. And again. And again. Until he was just sitting there in my arms dry heaving. Jeff helped me get the bath ready for my boy and cleaned up the couch where we had been sitting. I got the baby bathed and cleaned up, and soothed to sleep, and was finally able to change my cold vomit covered clothes.

Apparently now I have to wait until his next well-child visit at 9 months to find out if he really has a food allergy, and if we will become a gluten free family, or if we can try wheat again. Until then, I guess we're sticking to his fruits and veggies (which he LOVES, by the way).

Oh, here's what your baby will look like after an allergic reaction. And this is when the rash was already starting to get better.

P.S. We survived all of this, and are all finally healthy and happy at our home!