Where did that come from?

I am a few days late in posting this, but all last week Millie had been just a grouch. She was bitter, and grouchy, not sleeping well, had awful poop thus an awful bottom. I noticed she was teething her incisors, which historically have been rough for the Lyman kids, then make it all four at once and I suddenly had my reason for such a miserable baby.

Fast forward to Wednesday night, Millie spiked a fever in the middle of the night, approx 2am to be exact. I head off giving her Tylenol because it makes her loopy, but when it was clear that she was only getting hotter and was not going back to sleep, I gave in and dosed her up. Then I listened to her play in the bedroom for the next 2 hours until she finally crawled back into bed and went back to sleep. Through out the day, the fever visited every four hours as the Tylenol wore off, then through the night again too.

My rule is that I will do about three sleepless nights before it is time to see Dr Crago. Well, two nights put us at Friday, which of course is a do or die day. If I don't take her in on Friday, then I either have to weather it all weekend, or end up at Urgent Care for hours on the weekend. Thankfully the doctor had an appointment and we hustled in to see her. I gave the symptoms, explained that I thought it was just the teeth but then she started say "Ouch" when she would nurse on her right side and would put her hand up to that side of her head. Viola! It's gotta be her ears! Nope, ears checked out fine. Then Dr checked in her mouth and we had our answer: Coxsackievirus, aka Hand-Foot-Mouth disease. I had noticed, earlier in the week, the rash on her thigh and belly but the spots on her hands flew under the radar until, of course, Dr looked at her hands!

Then it started: I talked to my mom and heard "Where did she get that? Have you been to a McDonalds playground lately? You don't go to MOPS anymore, couldn't be from there, what about the play place at the mall? You know, you don't use that Floppy Seat like you used to with Harrison." Then I talked to Tom "I wonder where she got that from" Four kids into the journey, I have given up the urge to analyze and disect activities to figure out exactly where each virus comes from. I mean, what's the point? Will it keep us from ever visiting a McDonald's again? Unfortunately no. Will it keep me from ever putting her in a grocery cart again? No. Will we feel better about them being sick if we know right where they picked it up? Probably not. Just too much energy to try to trace footsteps of the week or two before symptoms to try to see exactly where it came from. With three other kids in school, it could have come home on one of them!