Very Tired People - A Thread For Parents

the older kid has gotten really into flamin' hot cheetos (her cousins introduced her at new years). Watched a movie and had some snacks last night and the younger kid really wanted regular cheetos but we didn't have any. commence full-on melt down, before he decided he wanted to try the flamin' hot. Ate one, drank a whole glass of water. "i don't know why but my tongue really wants water!" he ended up deciding he wanted a small bowl full. inhaled them, and then drank like three glasses of water. he had a big ole food/water belly and lay down on the couch next to me "my tummy hurts. use magic to make me not throw up"

I know times have changed a bit, but Kyle got his first phone at 11. I wasn't going to get him one, my dad got it for him. The joke ended up being on my dad, who is STILL paying Kyle's phone bill.  

Fuck, y'all, my wife is currently at the pediatric ER with my daughter. She's been so sick the past couple of days - congestion, really struggling to nurse because of it. RSV, flu, and COVID tests were all negative on Friday. We've been doing our damnedest, down to feeding her little by little with a medicine dropper, but they think she's dehydrated. They're running tests and giving her fluids, and I can't be there because only one parent is allowed at a time due to COVID restrictions.

It sucks loving something this much.

I'm so sorry! That first real illness is so tough.

Do you have a nose frida? They're disgusting but we had to use it liberally when my kid was an infant/toddler. Be sure to soften up the boogies with a nasal spray before sucking the snot out, for best results. Having a mostly clear nose will help with nursing at least.

Hang in there <3

Now they’re doing a spinal tap to check for meningitis. Fuck, this is scary.

Hope they figure it out soon, my friend. Hang in there. Eventually someone will figure it out.

If there’s anything you need, don’t hesitate to ask.

Kids and hospitals are scary, just take comfort in knowing they’re being constantly monitored. Hoping everything goes well for your family

Thanks for checking in. It’s not great. On one hand, everything they’ve tested her for so far has come back negative or normal. Her labs are fine. Her vitals are fine. Meningitis came back negative, both bacterial and viral. EKG was normal. Ultrasound of both her torso and her brain looked normal.

But she’s not well. She won’t eat (hasn’t nursed at all since yesterday morning), and she was very dehydrated. They have her on fluids, but she’s still very weak and hypotonic. And she still has bad congestion.

The going question now is botulism. No idea where she would have gotten that in NYC, but they’re running the test for it and flying medication in from California to give her either way.

If it’s not that, we’re kind of back to square one. It could still just be a virus she has to clear that really knocked her on her ass. Some of the scarier stuff doesn’t read - cerebral palsy wouldn’t have come on suddenly like this, and since this was an IVF pregnancy, we did a lot of genetic screening of both my wife and I prior to starting, and of our baby when she was an embryo.

But something is definitely wrong, and we don’t know what. I’m scared and so sad and I just want my daughter back. But we just have to wait and see what happens and what they can find. It sucks.

Hang in there - at least they are ruling some things out. Hoping they can diagnose it quickly and get her back to good health. Wishing the best for your little one!

Thinking of y'all <3

Is your wife still solo at the hospital with your daughter? Can I send her dinner?

It’s botulism antitoxin. I’m not sure of the actual name.

Botulism infusion was administered this morning around 11 AM. Unfortunately, it's going to be days before we know whether it works, let alone whether what's going on with her is actually botulism - the test results for that could be back as late as Monday, and the antitoxin is a progressive thing that could take up to a week to really kick in. So, now, we just wait.

I never in my life thought I'd be hoping for my child to have botulism, but I am right now. As sucky as that would be, it's treatable and usually fully recoverable, especially with the medication. If that's not what's going on...we kind of start talking about genetic disorders and other incurable things that could come with disabling complications. God knows how long testing for those things would take. It's shitty, because we did allll this screening as part of the IVF process, both of ourselves and the embryo, plus genetic screening of the baby when she was born, but they can't sit here and tell us that stuff caught everything, or even the things that it purported to catch, because there could be rare versions of those disorders that come with different genetic profiles. I swear to fucking god, if I spend my life losing every gambling opportunity I ever take and then hit some rando one-in-a-million shot on something like this, then just fuck everything forever.

So crazy. Fingers crossed this works. I find it so hard to believe it could be some rare genetic thing because of all the screening for IVF. Like that seems so left field. I am so sad that y'all are going through this, so fucking scary. I really hope there is improvement soon.