It's Friday, the day before Carson's 2nd birthday party. Yesterday I purchased food and drink for 35 people. Today I'm calling everyone invited to Carson's birthday to "un-invite" everyone under the age of 20. Why?
Wednesday, I noticed a rash on Carson's bottom. Thursday he was drooling non-stop. I just thought he was finally busting out the two year molars. Thursday night the rash had worked it's way down his legs and he had blisters on his feet. Strange but then a lot of weird things happen to kids. I Googled it late at night to try to play doctor and freaked myself out as usual. Probably not Malaria but strangely the symptoms did fit the bill for a strange thing called H-F-M-D.
Friday morning Carson was unbelievably cranky! I mean, his personality was abducted by aliens and they left some horrible, screaming one inside his body instead. I had to get out of the house so we headed to Boot Camp. I was going to call the doctor on the way but the rash looked a little better. The drool however continued like a broken faucet.
As any mom would, I asked other moms at Camp if they had ever experienced a rash like the one. Erin, the trainer, pipes up inbetween push-ups, "Jamie's kids have Hand-Foot-Mouth-Disease! You should call the doctor!"
Oh no, this could not be happening! My son could not have HFMD the day before his party. I stopped mid push-up and called the doctor. We made an appointment for 3:20. Carson didn't sleep at all and continued to be a super-crank. He had also stopped eating.
By 3:40, our diagnosis was official. Carson was in the middle of a full-blown case of Hand-Foot-Mouth-Disease. Highly contagious and extremely painful. The reason he wasn't eating, stopped taking the binkie, and couldn't stop drooling . . . very painful mouth sores. Fortunately the rash part is not painful, just hideous.
Holding back the tears, we headed to Walgreens to fill the prescription for Tylenol w/Codeine (to help him sleep), Magic Mouth (to dull the mouth pain), and a gallon of Captain Morgan's (to make mommy feel better). Carson screamed the whole way there. I gave the pharmacy technician explicit instructions that we needed them ASAP. She promised 30 minutes.
We killed 20 minutes in QFC calling the families with kids, letting them know that they couldn't come to help Carson celebrate his 2nd birthday. I felt terribly guilty about taking him in a grocery store but didn't really have a choice. I didn't let him touch anything but the cart. God help the poor person who took it after us. I've never sanitized carts before but I will from now on.
We left QFC with 6 bags of ice in the car and headed back to the pharmacy. Carson was still screaming so I opted to walk into the store rather than continue driving. I held him until the pharmacy tech looked down at her feet to say the prescription was not only not ready, it was being held up because they were waiting for clarification from my pediatrician. WHAT?!?!
I was so pissed I think I could have reached over the counter and strangled that woman in the white lab coat! I kept it together, called my pediatrician, struggled to keep Carson from screaming and touching everything.
Over the next 45 minutes while we waited for this never-ending nightmare to conclude, I gave up. Carson touched almost every toy in the toy department. He drooled on the 99 cent pantyhose. He coughed on the mascara. I went from being horrified to absolutely bitter. Who in their right mind would force a 2 year old to wait that long for a prescription.
We were there so long, I had to buy a pack of diapers to take care of business. That's when I discovered the 6 bags of melted ice pooling in my trunk. I was on the verge of a total break-down. Somehow left my tailgate open for the return trip into Walgreens. Came out with the prescriptions in hand, praying that no one had taken my gallon of rum. Pity the poor soul who even considered it.
I know this is probably my longest blog but this has quite possibly been one of the worst days of the last 10 years. Did I mention I'd been up all night with Carson because he couldn't sleep?
All because of some horrible virus called HFMD.
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