What's in that ear?

After a rough night last night with Meredith, I decided to take her to see her ENT today. She wasn't able to get to sleep last night until around 3 am. She just rolled around crying about her ears hurting until that time. I did my best to comfort her, but it didn't help much.

We saw another doctor in the practice at 1:15 pm today. Her usual doctor was in surgery today. It took four of us to hold Mere down long enough for the doctor to catch a peek into her ears. She was unable to see anything other than blood, dried blood. So, she put Mere on an antibiotic ear drop until Monday of next week when she will then have a procedure under anesthesia to clean out her ears and attempt to figure out what's going on in there. They will start with the gas. If she isn't still enough with that, they will have to put her under general anesthesia. They said it shouldn't take more than about 10 or 15 minutes once she's under.

Now, I know this doesn't sound all that bad, but the idea of her being put under general spooks me a bit. And, to top off the stress for that day, Anna starts kindergarten the same morning! So now I'm trying to figure out how to be in both places at once when both events are HUGE to us. Most of you know how big of a thing it has been to me that Anna's going to kindergarten. Ryan took off that day so that we could take her in together. Now, it will be only one of us as the other will have to be with Mere for her procedure. It's a really big deal to the both of us to always be there for our girls, especially in times like these, big days, so it just makes us a bit upset that we can't make that happen.

However, I know it will all be okay. I will update next week after the procedure so everyone knows how it went, and how she's doing.........and how Anna's first day at school was. I don't have a time set for Mere's procedure as of now. I take her in this Thursday morning for preregistration. We'll get a time at that point.

Please just say a prayer for the girls Monday morning that all with go smoothly for both. Thank you!

Points for the 2nd and 3rd opinions

I ended up taking them to the urgent care center last night around 7:15 pm. I kind of just knew that if I didn't, I'd end up in the ER with at least one of them during the night. The doctor spent all of literally about 30 seconds listening to the lungs of the two of them, and quickly diagnosed them both with bronchitis. The nurse tossed us orders for Zithromax and Rondec (a cough medicine) for both the girls. I went straight to CVS to have them filled. While I was waiting, I couldn't help, but concentrate on the lack of faith I had in the doctor and his diagnosis. The girls were feeling yucky, but nothing too bad. Within the twenty minutes it took to get the meds and make it home, Anna had fallen asleep after complaining she was really cold. Well, I pull her out of the car and she's burning hot. I checked her temp when we got inside, and it had spiked up to 103. I got the rounds of meds and breathing treatments in them, and got them into bed, but that wasn't before Anna starting throwing up from the fever and coughing that just wouldn't let up for her. Eventually it did, and she fell asleep around 10:30 pm. I felt so awful for her. We all know how terrible we feel when we are sick, and then have a fever that high.

Ryan was at a class last night during all of this. He's taking a course for the next three and a half weeks that is helping to prepare him to pass his nursing licensing exam. Today he's off because he has to work Saturday.

So, I started this morning with a call to the girls' pulmonologist. She was at the hospital for today seeing patients, and wouldn't be able to see the kids, but the office staff promised to get the message to her. I then called their allergy/asthma doctor. She too was not in the office today. So, I finally called their pediatrician who also specializes in asthma to a degree. They of course go the girls in within an hour of calling. So, we rushed to get ready, and drove over to the pediatrician. He checked them both, and concluded that they do NOT have bronchitis, and did not need to be on the antibiotic (Zithromax). He advised us to continue with the asthma medications we're already doing. If they aren't getting better by Monday he wants to see them again to then possibly start them on Orapred (oral prednisone-a steroid). He felt that they just had a respiratory bug, and didn't need to be on the antibiotic. While there he had to remove a lot of wax from Mere's ears in order to check them for an infection. This proved to be quite traumatic for her, as it usually is, and she cried herself to sleep on the way home. Her ears actually bled a bit from it too which was a bit scary for us, but the doctor assurred us that this is common.

Just as we got home, their pulmonologist called me. Did I mention I LOVE this doctor! She's simply wonderful. So, she wanted to know what was going on with the girls. I proceeded to tell her everything. She gave me some info on using another asthma medication we have if it's absolulely necessary, and also told me to continue with the antibiotic. She felt that because Anna not only had the spike in fever last night but also a low grade fever for several days, she has an infection her body is fighting, and it would be best to keep her on the antibiotic to prevent her from possibly developing pneumonia. She also said that if the kids are not getting better by Monday, they will most likely need to start the Orapred.

So, we are home. The girls are resting, drinking fluids, and taking their big ole' bucket full of meds.

We'll update again on Monday probably.

Thank you for the prayers and kind works! They love you all!!!

Oh! And on a side note, Meredith no longer sleeps in a crib! Last night was her first night in a big girl bed, and she did wonderfully! She slept in it the entire night, never fell out, and didn't come out of her room until we went in to get her this morning. Such a big girl now!

It's here a bit early...

We usually don't get hit with this until early fall, but it's already here. The girls are sick. It started this past Saturday evening with Anna, just a little cough. Mere started showing signs on Monday. She is miserable today. I'm actually trying to decide right now whether or not to take her to the urgent care place here because I have a gut feeling her typical croup will show up in the middle of the night tonight as it usually does. We'll see.....I'm hoping for the best so she can feel well and rest, both of them. They are on their routine meds when this happens, nebulizer, inhaler, allergy meds, cough meds......you name it, they're on it. I'll update tomorrow probably. I play to get them into the doctor tomorrow so we don't go into the weekend with this.