Milestones

There are several milestones that we are still looking forward to, like a day without spit up and a day when both children are out of diapers.

Several milestones have past...1st smiles, trying food for the 1st time.

Alexis is now in the stage where anything can be transformed into a song.  She started out just singing songs she knew...now we are hearing many different words to those tunes.  They change everyday, sometimes every time she opens her mouth to sing.  Yesterday while picking up candy from the birthday pinata, she was singing "we like candy, we all like candy, I'm getting candy, yeah yeah yeah".

Andrew is approaching more milestones that he hasn't quite reached yet like rolling over and sitting up.  Ok, those descriptions make him sound like a dog, but those are his next two in the "what your baby does in this range of months".  He reached a milestone this weekend that no mommy ever likes...the first ear infection/first time sick.

NO FUN.

My quiet, compliant baby was transformed into a screaming beast.  I tried everything (little tummies, warm washcloth, rocking, swinging, singing, walking, pumping legs, changing diapers, feeding etc).  Finally I opened the infant Ibuprofin because by this time, if nothing else, he has to have screamed himself into having a headache of his own.  All of the Infant medicine says either if under 2 yrs or under 6 mo, consult a physician, but desperate times call for desperate measures and for a baby that sleeps through the night, screaming in ways and volumes that you have never heard before at 1:30 in the morning is one of those times.  Besides he met the weight requirement.  He calmed down enough to sleep for more than 5 min at a time as long as I was holding him.

So later in the morning, after a little bit of rest, he seems ok.  Until his 2nd morning feeding.  The fussing began and so did my marathon calling session with the pediatricians office on a Saturday.  They are only open until noon on Saturdays and only 1 doctor is there.  I was going to get us in because I knew something was not right and I didn't want to pay triple just because I had to go somewhere else to tell me the same thing.  So I called and left a message on the nurses line because I almost always hear back within the hour and they either tell me to bring my kid in or tell me what specifically to do before I bring my kid in.  Oh, but not this time.  This time, our regular pediatrician is not in the office or on call.  He always takes me seriously when I think something is not right.  He knows that I don't call unless there is a reason.  This other doctor clearly did not know this about me and clearly did not know this was not normal for my baby (even though I told the nurse this on the message and when she called me back finally). This doctor told the nurse to tell me "every baby has their colicky times. If there is no other symptom like a fever or a runny nose, I don't need to see him."  What! excuse me! I told you he was screaming for hours (gave the hour range that he screamed), everything that I tried, and that he had NEVER screamed for no reason.  So I asked the nurse if she had any suggestions or if there was anything else I could do because I really think he might have an ear infection.  She told me she would ask the doctor again and call me back (she has spoken to me before and knew I wanted an answer).  So the nurse calls me back and said that I could watch him for another hour and if other symptoms show up that they would try to work him in.  This is at 10:30, so if I watched for an hour and called at 11:30 and if they checked the message immediately and get an appointment before noon, then I could make it there 10 minutes before they closed. Hmm, this doc was not taking me seriously.  So 15 minutes later, I took his temp again.  It was just over 99.  That was good enough for me.  I called, left my message, gave him a bath (because even though I could see in his eyes he didn't feel well, he liked the water enough to enjoy his bath).  Getting splashed trumps getting screamed at any day.  Took him out, called the appointment line and they told me they were going to transfer me to the nurses voicemail in order to get an appointment if it was for same day, and I told them, no that was not good enough because I had already left a message and spoken to the nurse twice that morning.  So she put me on hold and got the nurse and then told me to go ahead and come with no appointment.
Andrew was great, he was calm most of the time in the waiting room.  He let the nurse weigh him and do what she needed to do and then we waited for the doc. (It was a busy Saturday and we were not the only people waiting.)  And when she came in, he screamed when she tried to check his ear.  It took her by surprise because he was calm until she went for the ears and then he went nuts.  This episode though was nothing like he had been overnight and she was so concerned that he seemed so uncomfortable.  We left after the lights in the waiting area were already turned off with the prescription already called in for us and a dose of tylenol squirted in his mouth and told to have her paiged if he got any worse because she was concerned that he seemed to be so uncomfortable.  She was just sooo surprised that he didn't have any other sysmptoms like a runny nose.  Both the nurse that did his initial weight check and the nurse that I had spoken with on the phone popped back by the room when the doc stepped out and I was buckling him in his seat to asked me what was wrong (not if something was wrong).  When I told them ear infection, they said "we (meaning moms) know our kids. We're glad you were persistent. You called that one." Gold star for mommy.
Andrew does not take medicine as willingly as Alexis.  I don't think he understands these new flavors yet.  But we had a much more pleasant night last night with only a little bit of a fuss and a few changes to the feeding schedule.