At least, that's sort of what I feel like at the moment.
It all started last Wednesday. I noticed that morning that Paige seemed extra grumpy and wanted to cling onto me as I was trying to get ready for work. I told Mom to keep an eye on her and headed out the door. That evening as I was driving home, I got a call from Todd letting me know that she had developed a fever mid-afternoon and that she was presently down for an unusually late nap. She slept until 7 (only an hour before she normally goes to bed!) and then she got up and had some spaghetti for dinner.
All seemed well enough. Right up until she threw up on me. Spaghetti isn't really pretty the second time around. Just thought I would share that, you know, in case you were curious. Anyway, I knew it would happen sometime. No parent makes it through their kids' childhood without swimming in their share of puke.
I cleaned her up as best I could and tucked her in...she continued to vomit through the remainder of the night. And again the next morning as we were sitting in the doctor's office, where we were told it was likely a stomach virus but to bring her back the next day if no diarrhea developed and she was still feverish and vomiting.
The next day rolled around. No diarrhea, but a continuance of fever and puke. Back to the doctor's office we went (complete with yet another episode of throwing up in the waiting room) where they did a blood test to confirm that whatever she had was viral and all we could really do was ride it out and keep her hydrated.
In the meantime, to varying degrees Mom, Todd and I managed to catch whatever virus she was carrying. Lemme tell ya, it was a fun weekend in our household. Even one of the dogs got sick...even though that was likely a case of eating the stuffing out of one of his playtoys again.
Through it all, Paige remained fairly consistent with the fever and vomiting and we tried convince her to continue drinking fluids (a toughy at times). But then, her symptoms changed. Gone was the fever only to be replaced by what I'll just call a heavy cough. It sounds as if she has something thick in her throat that she can't cough hard enough to shake loose. Oh yeah - and she's STILL puking.
So, what to do now that things have changed up a bit? I tried really hard to not be one of "those" moms. Don't play coy with me...you KNOW who I'm talking about and I'm sure they annoy you just as much as they annoy me and the pediatricians that see their kids. I left a message on the nurse hotline for Paige's pediatric office and while usually they are so good about turnaround on callbacks, four hours later I was calling back and leaving yet another message. And yes, the message was quite polite...I understand that things happen. But when they called back, the nurse unfortunately didn't KNOW what to do and indicated they would put a message through to the doctor that saw Paige last Friday (when we do sick appointments I'm willing to see whoever in their office is available).
Then I spent the next hour and a half working myself into a frothing tizzy to the point where I was about a pair of shoes away from taking Paige to a local pediatric urgent care. Fortunately, I called Todd and he managed to talk me out of my tree. I made another appointment at her regular pediatric office and they are seeing us this afternoon.
And maybe it will turn out I AM the Mommy that cried wolf. But? I've decided that my kid's well-being and my sanity mean a lot more to me than my pride at not being one of "those" moms.
