Can't Catch a Break

The cold wintery weather is holding on as long as possible this year which means these winter germs aren't backing down at all either. Everyone has been fighting off a cold these past few weeks and it finally caught up with Charlie a few days ago. Started with the sniffles and then he developed a cough. Unfortunately it became evident that we were dealing with more than the common cold when he got a fever that just kept climbing and wouldn't go away despite regular motrin. Poor thing was miserable with tons of congestion and mucous making him cough pretty much nonstop and gag regularly.

I brought him to the pediatrician's Tuesday morning after his breathing became obviously labored and he wasn't making any improvements at all. Turns out his cold had developed into an ear infection and a rattling in his right lung that might be another round of pneumonia. The NP who saw us didn't want to expose him to another chest xray unnecessarily, so he prescribed an antibiotic that should be able to handle the ear infection and whatever is going on in his lung.

So after two days of antibiotics and no improvement at all, we went back to the pediatrician this morning. Our poor pitiful little boy has literally spent the bulk of this week on the couch requesting movies, cuddling, and sleeping whenever his cough allows him a break. The NP was obviously concerned. We ended up getting a CBC, nebulizer treatment, chest xray and inconclusive diagnosis. There is no sign of pneumonia, but they did detect irritation in his bronchioles.

The thought is that Charlie caught a cold, the cold aggravated his reflux, and his reflux has irritated his lungs. Because of the fever there is some infection somewhere, so they are being aggressive. He was given an antibiotic injection in the office and we were given a script for a new antibiotic for the next 10 days and are hoping this does the trick!

Today was CDH Awareness Day and we will be putting together a special post in honor of today as soon as things settle down here a little... and by settle down, I mean not being forced to sit on the couch and watch Elmo and Thomas for hours on end while trying to convince Charlie to drink more juice and water. :-)