What I do know is that this poor little guy has been sick 80% of his life. He is constantly fighting something and there is something seriously wrong with his immune system. But what? The last time he went to the doctor, we specifically asked his pediatrician Why and How he could be so sick for so long and this many times a year-- this can't be normal. She told us that it is normal for kids his age...What the? And that kids get 12 viruses on average a year. Hmmmmm. I don't remember Jimmy being sick like this, at least once a month. Are there just that many more strains of viruses going around? We had his tonsils and adenoids removed when he was two because of how often he was getting upper respiratory infections, colds and sore throats. The surgery hasn't seemed to decrease the amount or level of sickness in him. Whatever the reason, it has turned me into a real germaphobe. I find myself washing my hands several times a day and I carry hand sanitizer with me wherever I go because I am so afraid I am going to bring something else home to him from the grocery store or somewhere. I almost refuse to use a public restroom unless it is imperative or 100% necessary and completely unavoidable and when I do, I don't touch anything with my hands. I pull my sleeve over my hand and I flush with my foot.
I don't worry about things like his lungs and fevers that much on a daily basis because we have a nurse every day except Saturday that checks him and takes his vitals, so in a way I feel like he is getting good medical care at home. But, when I went to call the Doctor to see if I should be worried about him holding his head, I went to the Nursing Log and checked the last few days to see if he had been running a fever and maybe they forgot to tell me. Each day the nursing log said 97.5 degrees. Which struck me as a little weird that his temperature never fluctuated, even on days when I knew he was sick and felt warm to me. I went to find my ear thermometer (like the one the nurses use every day) and I noticed the battery light was on. I left Doodle with the nurse and went to the drugstore to get new batteries. When I came back the Doodle was sleeping. The nurse left and told me he was fine, sleeping it off and that his temperature was 97.5. A couple of minutes later, I went into the bedroom to check on him and saw that his breathing was really fast and I felt him and he was burning up. I put the new batteries in my thermometer and he had 103 fever. I checked it again about 10 minutes later and it went up to 104.5. I checked the thermometer that the nurses had been using and guess what? Yup. It told me he was 97.5.
Brain damage can begin at 105 degrees and with fevers come seizures, so at this point I am freaking out. I immediately called the doctor and he had me give him a full dose of children's Tylenol and children's Motrin at the same time. He said if his fever didn't come down to 101 or lower to bring him to the Emergency Room. Ugh. I was sick to my stomach. So I waited and waited and finally his temperature dropped to 99. Scary. Even scarier? A nurse that doesn't check the batteries in the thermometer and doesn't find it peculiar that a very sick and hot boy's temperature is 97.5 just because the thermometer says it is.
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