Xander Week 56 – Ear Infection Woes
November 8, 2007
Last week and the week before in our house have been miserable. Xander has been sick. Not the kind of sick that is easy to diagnose – no “oh, you have a runny nose, fever and a cough” nope, he was just mad – mad at me, mad at his dad, mad at his toys, mad at his bottles, etc. Nothing could make him happy. After about a week of this – which included little to no sleep – Zach took him to see his doctor. After a thorough exam, they decided it must be teething. Though we were hoping for an easier solution, we tried some Tylenol to help with the pain, tried ora-gel and cool things to chomp on. Still, Xander was miserable.
Finally, one Sunday night, we noticed that after Xander had been asleep for about an hour, he was covered in sweat – head to toe. We tried to take his temperature, but our thermometer wasn’t reading properly, so we brought him to the emergency room.
It was the most nerve racking moment we’ve had in a long time. At that point I knew there was something wrong with my child, and I also knew that there was nothing I could do to make it better. The not knowing was the worst – what if it was something awful? What if he contracted something awful? What if this was a life altering moment? It was horrible. After jumping through all of those ER hoops, we finally saw a doctor who looked in Xander’s ears for a while, and eventually decided that he had an ear infection. He prescribed amoxicillin and advised that we alternate between ibuprofen and Tylenol.
It still took another four days for the whiney, clingy, changing-mood-swings-faster-than-we-could-blink kid to finally go away. But when he did it was like a huge sigh of relief swept over our whole house. Evenings with Xander became fun again. He remembered how to laugh at himself, and how to entertain himself. Zach and I were able to share glances of “oh my gosh, how cute is he?” and “he is so amazing!”
It was finally when Xander was feeling better that we both realized how different he was when he was sick. It was just this overall mood shift that was so striking. It also made us realize how truly lucky we are to have such a happy-go-lucky kid. When he’s feeling ok, it is rare for Xander to get mad. He of course gets upset if he hurts himself, or is left alone, etc., but he hardly ever gets mad for an inexplicable reason. He’s such a happy kid, and we are so lucky to have him!!
Xander was diagnosed with his first ear infection last week. He hasn’t been overly fussy, and he hasn’t discovered his ears yet to tug on, so it was pretty tough for us to figure out that anything was wrong in the first place. Xander’s eyes were pretty watery and his “eye boogies” were more crusty than usual last week, and eventually I brought him to see his doctor, concerned that maybe he had pink eye. Thankfully, it was not pink eye, but he does have red and pussy ears – poor little guy 
So we picked up some bubblegum flavored Amoxicillin and started pouring that into his mouth twice a day.