Sarah's 6 month pictures

Here is our precious little girl at 6 months old. She is growing up way too fast. She is grabbing at everything now. She sits up by herself, but still falls every once in awhile. We are definitely enjoying every minute. More about Benjamin later...

Too Much Sickness

This past month has been a whirlwind of sickness. The Saturday before Christmas, Benjamin and Sarah woke up sick with colds. Benjamin's cold quickly turned into wheezing and Sarah's turned into an ear infection. Benjamin was given an inhaler and a steroid. The steroid made him aggressive and quite ill, so I am hoping they don't have to put him on that again. We were terrified that Sarah's cold was going to turn into RSV because of the nasty cough and congestion. After two weeks, she finally got better. Geoff and I also got sick, but not to the same extent as the kids. All the sickness made for an interesting Christmas, but we still had a good time.

This past Sunday, the kids and I skipped church because I didn't want them to get sick again. About mid morning, Benjamin started acting weird and eventually came down with a fever. I gave him Tylenol, but his fever stayed between 101-104. We called the doctor Sunday night because we were worried about his fever, but she said we were doing the right things to try to keep it down. She said it was probably a virus and to call back if his fever went above 105. I was worried about him and wanted to make sure he was ok during the night, so he slept with me in my bed. At about 11:30, he started throwing up. We got the sheets changed, got a bunch of towels, a bucket and went back to sleep. The clean sheets didn't last very long. He threw up most of the night, stopped at 5:30 am and we got a little bit of sleep. His fever stayed between 101-104 again on Monday. The doctor's office didn't have anymore appointments for the day, but said we could come in at 6pm for one of their after hours appointment. After checking for an ear infection, bladder infection (that was fun), the flu, and strep throat, they ran a blood panel. They found out that his white blood cells were 26,000 instead of 8, 000-13,000 indicating some sort of bacterial infection. They sent us to the hospital to have blood drawn for a blood culture to determine what kind of infection it was and how they were going to treat it. After having blood drawn, we went back to the doctor for a shot of antibiotics. The shot was so strong that they split it into two separate shots in each leg. They told us to come back the next day for another round of shots and to check on how he was doing. We had another night of restless sleep, but the throwing up finally stopped. We saw a different doctor the next day and he told us that Benjamin had a bacteria infection in his blood, but they didn't know what it was yet. He said that it was definitely a very serious thing and he was thankful that the doctor we saw the night before caught it and treated it with strong antibiotics. We went back to the doctor on Wednesday, but still didn't find out what kind of bacterial infection was in his blood. Thankfully, his white blood cells had gone back down and he didn't have to get another shot. She put him on oral antibiotics for 8 days and she said she would call with the blood results. We finally heard from the doctor on Thursday night. Benjamin had a form of strep bacteria in his blood. The medical name is streptococcus pneumoniae. Here's a website that explains it much better than I can: http://qs21.com/diseases/streppneumo.html The lab is now testing the strain of the bacteria and making sure it will respond 100% to the antibiotics that Benjamin has been given since some are antibiotic resistant. Benjamin has slowly been recovering each day. He finally started eating again, getting some energy and getting back to himself. He is arguing with us about all the normal stuff, so we know he is getting healthier. Now, we are hoping to stay well for a while. I know the doctor's office is tired of seeing us.