Under the Weather

I mentioned in the last post that Sophia has been a little under the weather the last few days.  It breaks our hearts to see her so unhappy and miserable.  Even Sam has been trying her best to keep her cheered up.

I could tell on Wednesday last week that she wasn't feeling like herself.  She really didn't want much milk to drink and she seemed so grumpy.  When I got her up on Thursday morning, she was burning up.  I immediately took her temperature and it read over 102 degrees.  By the middle of the day, her fever peaked to 103.6 degrees.  I gave her tylenol to keep the fever down and made sure that she had plenty of liquids.  Her appetite was gone.

Steve and I woke her up twice in the middle of night to give her tylenol (she was sleeping, but we wanted to be sure that the fever was "kept at bay").  By Friday morning, her fever was lower (just over 100 degrees), and I suspected a virus.  I confirmed this on Saturday afternoon when the rash started.  My self-diagnosis: roseola.

This is a common virus among infants and children, and Sam had it herself when she just about this same age.  It starts with a high fever, loss of appetite, droopy eyelids ... and then finally the rash hits.  Once the rash starts, it is a sign that the virus is leaving.  The rash is not itchy and is not contagious by skin-to-skin contact.  The good news is that once a child has it, they are immune to it for the rest of their lives; this explains why Sam didn't catch it this time -- she is already immune.  And because it is a virus, we have to let it run its course.  (I would have taken Sophia to the doctor if the symptoms became any more severe).

There has been a lot of crying in this household the last few days, and it has been quite draining on me.  I'm anxious to have my little girl back and to be able to do more things with her.  Even taking a walk results in frustrated crying for her and there isn't much we can do.  (I'm even leary to leave my windows open for fear the neighbors will start to wonder and turn me in to Child Protective Services)!

Trying to stay occupied (for all of about 5 minutes):

Then, when she became irritated with that, we moved outside.

We tried bubbles:

We tried playing with toys (notice how puffy and droopy her little eyelids are ... my poor baby):

The rash is still there today, but I'm glad that it isn't itchy and that her fever is gone.  Hopefully, she will be back to her smiling self in the next couple of days!