Hand, Foot and Mouth Disease

Peter began to have fever monday night. I was not having a good feeling about this since last time he had the fever and seizure. Tuesday was the first swimming lessons for Yaya's summer camp, but since she had an appointment with the dentist for he rroutine clean-up, i had to keep her home so that i did not have to drive around with a sick baby, transporting her. Peter acted better than expected, maybe because Yaya was around, we played outdoor, watching for ants, picking leaves. But that night, the fever persisted, and Peter could not sleep well. Bascially he cried once in a while, Lei was holding him until around 1am, when i got up and stayed with him for the rest of night. In the morning, i decided that i had to take him to the doctor's. He had kept crying, screaming, pulling his throat, which made me suspect that it was strep throat. No, it was not, the doctor dignosed right away--hand, foot and mouth disease. Yes, only there in the doctor's office, i noticed that there were rash coming up in his palms and feet. It sounded so scary to me, because he was under a lot of pain. I was told that it was unfortunately a virus infection, very contagious(yes, all his class turned out to be sick, so did Lei afterwards), but harmless(thank god for that). The bad thing was that there were nothing much the doctor could do to help him feel better, we just had to wait for the virus to get its course. Wednesday was a nightmare for poor Peter, he barely ate or drink anything. He always wanted to be held upward on my shoulder and walking around the house. Whenever he swallowed or coughed, i guess it made him more painful in the throat, he just pulled himself off me, threw himself onto the floor, kicking, screaming, and crying. It was the hardest thing for a mom to be there, watching your baby suffering but could not do a thing to help. I tried to talk to him, massage him, which only resulted in more screaming. Eventually all i did was sitting close to him and shared our tears. Poor Peter, mommy is so sorry. If there was anything that mommy could have done to help, I would have done it for you. That day was extremly long and Peter was in a sub-concious state. Since Peter was having ear infections at the same time, he was prescribed 4 medications, tylenol(or motrin), antibiotics, and two more to ease the pain in his throat. Of course he refused to put anything in his mouth, but as an adult, i had to force them by a dropper. By the end of Wednesday, Peter became sensitive in seeing the dropper--whenever i was close to the dropper, he started to cry right away.

Thursday, I guess the peak of the virus course was over, Peter began to take a little bit of selected food. When i took him to the grocery store to get some soft food for him, he even smiled to the cashier, which, my baby, really lessened the pain in mommy's broken heart. I strolled him outside to distract this poor little boy and his mood was still good for one minute and then bad for another. One thing i knew was that he was deprived of sleep, because he could not sleep as well for the past couple of days. But for a kid, the more he needs sleep, the more difficult for him to fall asleep. I could not bear to put him in the crib and let him cry for another minute, since he already had enough emotions from the sickness, therefore i had to alternate my rule, rocking and patting him--which might be a bad thing for later. Anyway, he was not satisfied with playing with mommy anymore by the end of the day, and since he acted energetic and active, we sent him to school on Friday.

Peter was finally getting better after suffering over 72 hours, but one thing for sure that was not good was that he became very clingy to me. No one was welcomed to touch him anymore, including daddy, and most of the time, he wanted to be held. But on the other hand, i finally felt relieved a little and the tireness became really bothering me. Peter still cried more than normal and he began to have a hard time at nap time, occasionally even at bedtime to fall asleep by himself. I guess that was the price i had to pay. Every morning, he woke up before 5:30am for the past severl days, on Sunday, Peter and I even played at a park close to home at 7am in the morning.

But definitely i am happier to see him not so miserable anymore. I know though there are a lot of work to be done for him to go back to the real happy, independent boy.